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Chapter Text

Odysseus had been missing for seven years, and Telemachus was getting sick and tired of all the podcast weirdos trying to get him or his mom to endorse whatever pet theory they came up with to explain the disappearance.

You see, Odysseus Laerson was a well-known army general who, post-retirement, went to speak at international conferences. During the latest of these, his plane had gone down, never to be recovered. Dozens of conspiracy theorists had scoured his life trying to come up with a reason, convinced it had to be government malfeasance. During their scouring, they’d inevitably come calling to the house of his wife and son. Each one with a more ridiculous theory than the last.

The next one to come knocking was going to get a broken nose, this Telemachus swore.

“There was someone skulking around the house, Peisi,” he was saying, pacing a bald spot in his best friend’s living room carpet.

Peisistratus, lounging on the couch, eyed the joint in Telemachus’ hand.

“You sure you didn’t just overindulge?” he asked. “You know Nausicaa and her…experiments. I wouldn’t put it past her to have accidentally created ‘paranoia: the plant.’”

Telemachus waved him off. “Nah, I was completely sober. I ran out a few days ago, and my medical card is still in limbo. Hence why I needed to buy from your sketchy-ass roommate.”

“Heard that!” Nausicaa called from the other room.

“Love you, don’t murder me in my sleep!” Telemachus called back to her.

“So, the skulking?” Peisistratus asked, bringing the topic back around.

“Yeah. That. I saw a van that passed my house like five times, and the dude driving was just staring at the door. Fucking creepy, honestly.” He paused to take a drag of the joint. “It was a pretty cool van, though. Had a sick mural of a wizard riding a direwolf.”

“Well, at least it’s distinctive. That way if you’ve gotta call the cops again, you got something to give ‘em,” Peisistratus noted brightly.

Telemachus laughed, finally sitting down, tossing one arm over the back of the couch. “You’re probably right. Good thing for overconfident assholes who don’t realize a custom paint job just means a spotlight on you when you do something nefarious.”

Peisistratus handed him a ginger ale- blackberry, his favorite flavor- and they settled in to watch whatever musical Peisistratus insisted was going to be the next Hamilton. Something about an alien hive-mind destroying a small town.

Okay, it was pretty funny.

A few hours later he was dragging himself through the door to his and his mom’s house, glaring at the van parked down the road. It was not nearly as inconspicuous as it thought it was, sitting on the side of the road with that eye-searing mural on it. Whatever; as long as it wasn’t in their driveway, the cops wouldn’t do shit. As he very well knew, because they’d practically stopped coming out period.

His mom was bent over the kitchen table, ironing around ten thousand tiny fabric squares.

“New commission?” he asked.

She hummed in confirmation. “Someone wants a quilt patterned with all fifty states, with state birds and state flowers to accompany them. Apparently, they had one like that from their grandmother, but it got stolen.”

“Yeowch. Both it getting stolen, and your poor hands.”

“They’re paying good money for it,” Penelope said with a grin. “If my hands get too sore, I might just dip into your stash,” she joked, elbowing Telemachus in the side.

“Mother!” he fake-admonished, hand to his chest like a scandalized church lady.

Penelope cackled, going back to her work, ironing and pinning fabric with a practiced ease that came with a lifetime of work in the fiber arts and textiles.

He kissed the top of her head and went to fix them dinner. He’d taken over a lot of the house chores, since his worsening migraines meant he wasn’t really able to work that much. The weed helped the pain, but he didn’t trust himself to drive on it, and most employers frowned on showing up to work smelling like cannabis. He did still work two-three days a week, handing out samples at the grocery store in walking distance, but that wasn’t a whole lot of income. Most of it went to doctor’s bills and pot.

He kept dinner simple, just broccoli-stuffed chicken they bought in bulk, and some mac’n’cheese. Filling, tasty, easy.

The van was still there after they ate. Telemachus glared at it from between the slats of the blinds on the kitchen window. Frustration mounting, he flipped the blinds closed and stomped to his room to grab a pre-roll Nausicaa had given him.

He had the lighter to the tip of it when he finally snapped.

Abandoning the joint on his bedside table, he marched out the front door and right up to the driver’s side window. He slapped the glass with his palm until the person inside finally rolled it down.

“Hey,” the man behind the wheel said, grinning lazily as he waved. He was surprisingly buff for someone who stalked people from a van, and surprisingly pretty. He was black, with locs pulled into a neat ponytail, one ear full of piercings, as well as one through his lip. His eyes were two slightly different shades of brown; the right one had more depth and movement to it, leading Telemachus to assume the left might be a glass eye.

“What the fuck do you want?” Telemachus begged. “Can’t you guys leave us alone? We don’t know what happened to my dad, okay?”

“That’s what you would say,” a voice piped up from the back.

“Eury, shut the hell up,” pretty man said, turning to glare at someone Telemachus couldn’t see from the angle he had.

The man turned back to Telemachus. “Ignore him, what were you saying?”

“I was telling you to kindly fuck off,” Telemachus snapped. “You’re like the hundredth group of conspiracy whackos to show up to pester us. I don’t care how many followers your damn podcast has, this is my life, alright?”

“How’d he know about the podcast?” a third person asked, also from the back of the van.

“How many of you assholes are in there?” Telemachus groaned, throwing his hands up in frustration.

“Just the three of us. Amphi, you aren’t helping either.”

“Sorry.”

“I’m Antinous,” the pretty man said, reaching his hand out of the windows for a handshake. Reluctantly, Telemachus took it. “And this isn’t the best place to have this discussion, I don’t think. How about we drive down to that cute café I saw not too far. Purrcolate, I think it was called?”

“I’m not getting in a van with three strange men, I’m not that stupid,” Telemachus told him. “Also that’s a cat café, it has a ten-dollar entry fee.”

“Oh shit, yeah! Let’s go see some cats!” the third person- Amphi, or whoever- cheered.

He fought his way up from the back, scrambling over audio equipment to plop himself down on the passenger seat. He was also black, though lighter-skinned than Antinous, and his hair was a puffball of a ponytail. He was also much skinnier, though it was more like a lean and trim kind of skinny, not the same scrawny and bony as Telemachus was.

“Amphinomus, at your service,” he said brightly. “Eurymachus is the grumpy asshole who’s still hiding in the back. Anyways, we run a podcast all about missing 411 cases, and we just wanted to interview you guys. We won’t push any of that conspiracy garbage on you. I mean, a vast majority of these cases have simple, mundane explanations.”

“Speak for yourself,” grumbled Eurymachus from the back.

“Eury, shut the fuck up!” Antinous and Amphinomus shouted at him in unison.

“Listen. To. Me,” Telemachus growled, leaning into the window to speak directly to Antinous. “I gave my statement already. Seven years ago, when my dad first went missing. I know about as much as any true-crime amateur with a microphone and a laptop does, and that hasn’t changed. You three have been stalking my home for three days now, and I am sick and tired of this whole circus. Back the fuck off and leave me and my mom alone.”

“You’ve got some bite, Little Wolf,” Antinous said with a raised eyebrow. “You sure I can’t buy you a coffee, at least?”

His eyes flicked down Telemachus’ body, then back to his face, lazy grin ticking up a few notches.

“N-no!” Telemachus sputtered. “Fuck all the way off!”

With that, he turned his heel and stomped away, back into his house. He was going to ignore how horribly red his entire being had become.

Chapter Text

Sometimes, Telemachus could be brave. Tonight was not one of those times.

The plan had been to invite Peisistratus over, have a nice dinner, and finally confess the feelings that Telemachus has had for him since they were both ten. But then dinner had happened, and Telemachus had lost his nerve. Instead, they were now under a blanket on the couch, watching the sequel to the last musical.

“So, are they singing because they’re infected again, or what?” Telemachus asked, taking the excuse to lean into Peisistratus’ side a little bit.

“It’s an alternate universe thing. I like to theorize that the singing is still caused by extraterrestrial interference, but that’s just speculation,” his friend said.

Telemachus may have been biased, but Peisistratus was the most beautiful person he’d ever met. He had deep tan skin, and auburn hair that fell in loose curls around his shoulders. His eyes were dark green, and Telemachus had spent two months at one point visiting every craft store within fifty miles to find an alcohol-ink marker that matched their shade. They were around the same- short- height, with Peisistratus being only an inch or so taller. When they were younger, and Telemachus more insecure, he’d been incredibly grateful for it. Having a cis boy be the same height as him helped the dysphoria.

Sometimes, when he looked at Peisistratus, it was like literal sparks would fly.

Except. Wait. There were literal sparks in Telemachus’ vision.

“Oh fuck, migraine incoming,” he mumbled, shrugging out of the blanket. He had about two minutes to get to his bedroom and take his emergency meds before the rest of the night was absolutely ruined.

When he stood up, he realized he was too late, as the pain and nausea hit him like a truck, and he crumpled to his knees, hand over his mouth to keep from vomiting as the room spun.

Peisistratus sprinted from the room, coming back with the blister pack of meds and a trashcan. He stuck it under Telemachus’ face exactly two seconds before the latter lost his battle with his stomach, and subsequently lost his dinner into the plastic can.

“I’ll be right back with some water,” Peisistratus told him softly, rubbing between his shoulder blades.

All Telemachus could muster was a groan.

The water tasted sweet as it washed away the acid and bile, and he tried to focus on that and not the intense feeling of disappointment and anger that his nice night with his best friend had been ruined. Smashed into miserable bits like a plate on the kitchen’s tile floor.

He took his meds, and let Peisistratus manhandle him back onto the couch, trashcan on the floor where he could roll over and use it at a moment’s notice.

Penelope was at a quilter’s convention that weekend, and he didn’t feel like calling her back just to deal with something that happened constantly, so he started resigning himself to a lonely rest of the evening. It would be just him, the trashcan, and sweet, sweet unconsciousness.

“I’m off work tomorrow,” Peisistratus told him. “I can stay the night if you want.”

Yes, Telemachus wanted.

“I can’t ask that of you,” his traitorous mouth said instead of accepting the comfort offered.

“Which is why I’m offering, knucklehead,” Peisistratus said, fingers warm where they rested on Telemachus’ neck. Soothing. Comforting.

“…Okay,” he finally said.

The world was still spinning, and he doubted he could walk on his own in this state. He’d just have to wait for the meds to do their job, and maybe they could keep watching the musical.

He'd like to keep watching the musical, especially if he could somehow convince Peisistratus to keep petting his hair like that.

He fell asleep the second the meds kicked in.

“Those guys are still there?” Peisistratus asked incredulously, peering through the kitchen window at the van. “It’s been like a week. Don’t these people have lives?”

“They’ve probably got sponsors and Patreons,” Telemachus said, nursing his coffee. “None of these jack-offs work, like, a normal freaking job. It’s all digital nomads and sovereign citizen types with daddy money.”

It was morning, and the migraine meant his sleep had been shit, so he was still exhausted.

Peisistratus made a rude hand gesture to the van, not that they’d be able to see him from that angle. It was more just to make Telemachus snort into his breakfast blend. It accomplished that goal, and he barely managed not to send hot coffee through his nose.

Antinous had made a habit of waving and trying to chat with him every time he made his way from the house to his car, and had asked him out one more time. The man wasn’t unattractive- maybe not Telemachus’ usual type, but some people transcended type- but there were two big reasons Telemachus was going to keep turning him down.

The first was probably a bit silly. Telemachus felt like it would be unfair to date someone when he carried such a huge torch for someone else. He didn’t feel confident in his ability to be a good partner while pining, and anyone with even a hint of jealousy would want him to cut Peisistratus off. Which he categorically was not going to do.

The second was that the motherfucker was stalking him, and he wasn’t nearly that stupid.

Telemachus didn’t tell either his mother or Peisistratus, but the van had followed him to work twice. Well, tried to follow him to work. He’d managed to duck into a side road both times and shake off the tail. His manager was a pretty understanding woman when it came to his baggage, but she probably still wouldn’t be thrilled with three podcast bros showing up and bothering customers.

“Honestly, I wouldn’t mind all these amateur sleuths hanging around if they did anything other than try and corner me and mom to try and validate their pet theories. Like, can’t these guys go and trawl Appalachia for his plane? Try and find where he really went down? I’d respect them a lot more if they did that instead of harassing a widow and her son.”

Peisistratus’ hands tightened where they were holding onto the side of the sink. “You really think he’s dead?”

“Mom doesn’t. She thinks he’s going full survivalist out there. That maybe he got bonked on the head and forgot who he was, so he’s just living in a cave or something. I think it’s been seven years.”

“I mean, your dad was a badass. If anyone could survive seven years in the wilderness, it’d be him.”

Peisistratus had always admired Odysseus. It was almost like the man had been a second father. Peisistratus was the youngest of several, and his own father had already been quite up there in age when he was born. And while Odysseus was busy, gone more than he was home, he at least had the energy to play when he was.

Telemachus never minded that, especially since it meant Peisistratus could come over all the time when they were tiny kids.

“I hope so. It’s just…hard, you know? To keep hoping that he’ll show up on the doorstep one day with a good explanation,” Telemachus said, stirring way too much vanilla-caramel creamer into his second cup.

“If he’s still alive, he’s trying his damndest to get back home to you, that I know,” Peisistratus told him. Then, to break the tension, he added, “Also Nausicaa says that when he turns up, she’s asking to be his and your mom’s third.”

“Gross!” Telemachus groaned between giggles, jumping on the opportunity for a lighter topic. “I don’t need to hear another Nausicaa classic DILF rant.”

“Look, I’d rather it be about your dad than mine; the man’s almost seventy!”

“Speaking of, are he and your mom really going to get married again? This is, what, the third time?”

Peisistratus rolled his eyes. “Yeah. After his latest cancer scare, they’ve decided they’re soul mates again. I got the text about it and was convinced he was dying. They’re going to the courthouse next week. Just them, me, and my siblings. I’ve been told to wear yellow.”

Telemachus cackled, and if there was a slight hysterical edge to it, Peisistratus was too polite to mention it.

There were two cats on Telemachus’ lap, and this is the only reason he didn’t storm out of the café when a certain menace showed up in Purrcolate.

Telemachus had just sat down, hot chocolate in hand, to work on one of the puzzles they had available for customers to put together while they sipped their drinks and pet a cat. Captain and Bernie, a skinny little seal-point and a fat gray ragdoll, respectively, had immediately each taken a leg. He’d barely gotten a few corner pieces placed when he heard the low rumble of the bastard that had been practically camping out at his front door.

Antinous was talking to the barista, Leander, a chubby guy in his late twenties or early thirties- Telemachus had forgotten his exact age- and laying on the charm.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” Telemachus muttered under his breath.

Once the man had his drink in hand, he turned and noticed Telemachus, face lighting up in a shark’s grin. Much to the latter’s chagrin, he came to sit on the beanbag chair next to him.

“Little wolf. Glad to see you. Thought any more about that interview?”

“Answer is still no,” Telemachus told him venomously.

“Ah, that’s all right. You’ll come around,” Antinous said with a dismissive wave.

“What are you doing here? I didn’t see your creep van sneaking around. Did you switch vehicles to follow me or something?”

“Nope. Purely a serendipitous coincidence. I’m here for a different interview, and thought I might as well say hello.”

“Is there another one of those missing cases here in town?” Telemachus was so mad at himself for engaging, but he was already there, and the cats weren’t budging anytime soon, so he might as well see what this guy’s angle was.

“Nah. The missing 411 stuff is all Amphinomus and Eurymachus, I have my own podcast that I do. We just travel together and help each other out.”

That actually helped relax Telemachus’ hackles; if Antinous wasn’t horribly invested in digging through every aspect of the case like a cat with a juicy songbird, maybe he could talk the other two into leaving. Soon.

“Oh? What’s your podcast about?” Telemachus pushed. Partly due to genuine curiosity, partly because he was stuck having this conversation, may as well.

Antinous chuckled a little bit, his grin more wry than smug. “Something much more embarrassing. I do amateur cryptid hunting.”

“Like bigfoot?” Telemachus asked, his voice absolutely deadpan.

“A little bit. Also things like wendigos, or river monsters. Or, since we’re in the area, I’ve been looking into the Ozark Howlers.”

“Ozark Howlers are just a hoax started by moonshiners,” Telemachus told him. “You might have better luck with the Fouke monster.” The latter half was a lie- Fouke was probably just as much as hoax- but Antinous didn’t have to know that.

“I’ve heard that a time or two. Never hurts to check for myself though,” Antinous shrugged. “The three of us are actually heading to Devil’s Den tomorrow to check out some creepy rumors, if you feel like joining.”

“I’m not letting strangers take me to a secondary location,” Telemachus told him. “I’m still not an idiot, and I don’t want to wind up as one of your friend’s podcast episodes.”

“You’re very mistrusting,” Antinous noted.

“My father is military and my mother’s Texan; I was taught that the best form of self-defense is to not get into dangerous situations in the first place.”

“And I suspect you knew how to use a gun before you could walk?” Antinous prodded, eyebrow raised.

“Eh. I can use one, but they freak me out if I’m honest.”

“Come on, get out of the house for a bit. If you’re that worried, bring that cute redhead you have over every other day,” Antinous pressed.

“Three against two still sounds like iffy odds to me,” Telemachus pointed out.

Antinous was about to say something, but they were interrupted by Leander making an appearance.

“Okay, I’ve got thirty minutes. You wanted that story, right?” he asked Antinous. Then he seemed to notice Telemachus was also sitting there. “Tele! Hey, haven’t seen you at the PFLAG meetings in a while. You doing alright?”

“As good as I ever am,” Telemachus answered ambiguously. “Just…busy.”

“Well, when you can come next, tell me. Hiro and I have been stress baking something fierce, and I remember your mom appreciates Hiro’s cinnamon muffins.”

“Ah. Thanks, that would be awesome,” Telemachus told him sincerely.

“Your story?” Antinous interrupted. “The one about the, what did you say, voice-stealer?”

“Oh, right! Yes. So Hiro and I were camping two years back, when I wake up paralyzed. This isn’t new for me, since I’ve got narcolepsy and it can do that. What I wasn’t expecting-”

Leander launched into a story about him and his girlfriend encountering some sort of creature in the Devil’s Den campground that had attempted to lure them out of their tent at three in the morning, mimicking his and Hiro’s voices.

“Then, not ten minutes after it finally runs off, the sky opens up and it just fucking pours. Had to pack up in total darkness and shiver our way to the nearest gas station without a working ac. It was absolute mayhem,” Leander finished. At some point he’d gotten his own mug of coffee.

“I’ve known you five years now and you never told me any of this!” Telemachus said, smacking his arm without any real strength.

“It makes me sound insane, dude. I only tell people I know are open to the weird,” Leander told him, crooked grin in place.

Antinous turned off his tape recorder. “You want to be credited, or should I leave your name out?” he asked.

“Leave my name out. The café isn’t my only job, and I don’t think my other one will be super thrilled to be associated with all of this.”

“Oh shit, yeah. Your grandad’s church,” Telemachus noted, sucking his teeth with a grimace.

“Yup. Doubt a Methodist minister wants his grandson spouting off about skinwalkers and shit.”

“You willing to hike back out there and show us where it happened?” Antinous asked, still in business mode.

“Nope. I have a girlfriend and our cadre of cats to think about; I’m not getting eaten by a creature. I can show you on a map, though.”

Telemachus chewed at the inside of his cheek.

Okay, so he’d been super into monsters and cryptids when he was little, and some of that never left him. He’d wanted to be a monster hunter when he was a kid, and maybe it was a little bit because his parents hadn’t kept a close eye on his television habits and didn’t realize he was watching Supernatural way too young- yes, he did ship Destiel, no, he wasn’t going to talk about it- but it was also because he’d felt so small and powerless for most of his life.

Even before the migraines and his panic disorder, he’d felt so tiny in comparison to his parents. They had accomplishments. Odysseus was the youngest general in near a century, and Penelope…well, her service record was behind so much red tape no one ever talked about it. Not even her, not even to him.

Oh, but going would be a horrible idea. Best case scenario, he’d spent the night being interrogated by three podcasters about his father’s military ties- who might have sabotaged the plane, why the location services stopped working. When really, it had already been risky flying that tiny two-seater so close to the mountains, and the signal was simply lost because, again, mountains.

Worst case scenario, he either got eaten by a cryptid or had his organs harvested. There were other horrifying thoughts that plagued his mind as well, but he figured death would probably be worse than any of those.

…Maybe if Peisistratus borrowed one of Nausicaa’s guns.

“Lee! Back to work!” the shop owner called.

“Yes ma’am!” Leander called, standing back up as he finished his coffee. “Well, gotta run. Beans won’t grind themselves.”

“I should be off, too,” Antinous said. Once Leander was out of earshot, he winked at Telemachus. “See you at home.”

“You are not as funny as you think you are!” Telemachus snapped as the man walked away.

“Debatable!”

Chapter Text

“I swear to god, I’m going to clockwork-orange you with Milo Rossi videos if you keep opening your fucking trap,” Amphinomus finally snapped.

He was the one driving the RV- apparently the wolf van was for stake-outs and traveling around town only- and subsequently the one who had to listen to Eurymachus rant about some pseudo-scientific conspiracy bullshit for the umpteenth time from the passenger seat.

“Look, it would just make sense,” Eurymachus shrugged. “I’ll show you pictures later, but it’s definitely a melted pyramid.”

Eurymachus, it turned out, was a ginger white guy approximately the same height and build as Antinous, with the addition of a scraggly beard and an apparent addiction to tank-tops.

The back of the RV had a table that Antinous, Peisistratus, and Telemachus were all sitting around, Peisistratus tucked up next to Telemachus. He did indeed have one of Nausicaa’s smaller guns tucked into a holster on his waist.

Telemachus had taken what turned out to be too much of an edible before getting in the vehicle approximately an hour ago, and was maybe in a state of time dilation as he watched Antinous and Peisistratus glaring silently at each other.

Achingly slowly, he lifted a fry to his mouth and chewed it. He’d made them stop for burgers about ten miles back, and he was trying to finish the fries before they got too cold and weird to be enjoyable, but his body felt like he was stuck in the Great Boston Molassacre of 1919. He was swimming towards the salt and deliciousness as fast as they would allow.

“So,” he started, trying to think of something to break the mutual fury between his best friend and his stalker. “Do y’all just live out of this RV, or what?”

“We usually rent a place when we get to a town,” Antinous grunted through clenched teeth, not blinking. Or maybe he was and it was just too fast for Stoned Telemachus to notice.

“So, basically yes?”

“I’ve got a house back in Minnesota.”

“You can afford a house?” Telemachus asked incredulously. “The podcast pays that much?”

“Bought it with my mom’s life insurance payout. She liked riding motorcycles; people don’t like looking for motorcycles on the road.”

“Fuck, I’m sorry dude. That has to suck.”

“We weren’t close.”

For some reason, that was what caused Peisistratus to deflate, eyes turning concerned.

“Sometimes that can just make the grieving process takes longer,” he said sympathetically. “My oldest half-sister lost her mom a few years ago, and she’s still in therapy. They also…weren’t very close.”

Antinous blinked in surprise, not having expected sympathy from the man he’d been glaring at for the better part of an hour.

They actually began a nice, if still stiff, conversation about their respective families. Telemachus listened with the rapt attention only managed by the inebriated.

Peisistratus’ mom was his dad’s fourth wife, and the mother of three of old Nestor’s children. Peisistratus was the youngest of nine, though most of his siblings were so distant from him in age that he didn’t have much in common with them.

Antinous was also the youngest, though only of three, and all of them were full siblings. His parents had split while he was in preschool, and their dad managed to swing custody.

“Mom probably would have gotten it, except she didn’t want to be tied down,” he explained. “Dad was a cranky bastard. Didn’t hit us or anything, he just liked the sound of his own voice a little too much.”

Antinous paused to take a sip of his soda. “Probably where I got it from.”

“Well, at least you’re self aware,” Telemachus joked.

“NO, EURY, I don’t think the CIA is hiding the existence of giants from us!” Amphinomus screamed, skidding the RV to a halt. “Antinous, your turn to drive, I can’t fucking take this.”

He slammed the door open, practically diving from the seat so he could storm to the back.

“Yeah, yeah. Keep making the one-eyed guy drive. Surely that won’t cause problems with the cops,” Antinous grumbled, though he reluctantly acquiesced and got out to go to the driver’s side.

“I’d say just make Eurymachus leave the driver alone, but I don’t want him bothering us either,” Peisistratus whispered into Telemachus’ ear.

After a delayed couple of seconds, Telemachus remembered how to laugh. God, he hoped some of this wore off soon; he was going to be useless on the hike. Even if they did see something spooky, it would probably just eat him.

“Hey boys, whatcha whispering about?” Amphinomus whispered as well, leaning in close as he slid into the seat across from Telemachus.

“Making fun of your cohost,” Peisistratus informed him.

“Ah. So, same thing as Antinous and I do, got it,” Amphinomus nodded, leaning back against the bench seat. “Either of you know how to play cards?”

By the time the RV reached the parking lot for the trailhead, Telemachus was merely feeling floaty and off kilter, but more firmly placed in the space-time continuum. More distantly, he was also glad he’d over prepared and stuffed his backpack full of water bottles. His mouth was dry just looking at the snow-muddied path they’d be trekking down.

He'd also beaten both Amphinomus and Peisistratus in canasta twice, so there was that.

“Oh, I remember this trail,” Peisistratus said, taking a preemptive sip of his own water bottle. “We hiked it when I was in the scouts.”

“Really? My troupe leader always said this one was too difficult,” Telemachus groused. “We were too busy making yarn coasters to do anything interesting, of course. We went down the one-mile trail instead.”

“Is that the same troupe leader that tried to get you to stop hanging out with me because my parents were divorced? I’m not surprised she was allergic to fun.”

The five of them started down the trail, Amphinomus in the lead, Antinous and Eurymachus consulting a map in the center, and Peisistratus and Telemachus in the rear, reminiscing.

“God, I remember the last meeting I ever went to,” Telemachus was saying. “It was this dinner that organization had put on, and my troupe was supposed to be getting an award. Literally my mom and I were the only ones there out of the entire troupe. Not even the troupe leader and her kid were there! Never felt more embarrassed in my life.”

“Should have joined my troupe once you were out,” Peisistratus told him. “I’d have vouched for you.”

Antinous cut in, looking up from the map. “I didn’t think your town was big enough to host two different boy scout troupes. Was it a different schools thing?”

“I was in girl scouts. Contrary to the narrative a lot of trans folk tell cis people so we don’t get called posers, I didn’t pop out of the womb knowing I was trans. I figured it out at twelve,” Telemachus told him.

“Puberty?” Antinous guessed, one eyebrow raised.

“Puberty,” Telemachus confirmed. “The second I started fucking bleeding, I realized something was up.”

Also, when he’d first been hit with the hormonal horniness and learned what ‘masturbation’ was, he’d felt like something was missing. His hand had automatically gone to stroke an appendage that straight up did not exist. Not that he was telling anyone that who wasn’t his therapist; period talk was one thing, but he had some sense of conversational decorum.

One day he was going to get the courage to make that phallo appointment. Anesthesia just made him tetchy.

“That explains why some of the reporting said he had a daughter,” Eurymachus noted. “I just assumed they were dumbasses, didn’t realize they were also assholes.”

Huh. Maybe Eurymachus wasn’t as much of a douche as Telemachus first thought. A thing to tuck into the back of his mind.

“So, what are we looking for?” Peisistratus asked. “Weird footprints?”

“Yeah, stuff like that. Footprints, any blood on the snow, weird breakage patterns in the tree branches. Once we get a bit deeper in the woods, listen for anything that sounds out of place,” Antinous explained. “I don’t expect we’ll find much during the daytime, but this is just a preliminary look before we come back out to camp overnight. It’s been a minute since we could pull the tents out,” he added cheerfully.

“Are you three insane? It’s winter!” Telemachus said. “I know you’re probably used to Minnesota winters, but Arkansas still gets pretty cold at night. Five degrees can kill you just as well as negative five.”

“Our tents are Alaska rated,” Amphinomus laughed. “I’ve slept like a cozy baby in negative forty.”

“You also had the tent heater, Amphi,” Eurymachus reminded him.

“Got that from a sponsor deal,” Amphinomus said with a grin. “Then I immediately bought a second one just in case.”

About a mile and a half in, they paused to take a quick water-and-trail-mix break, Telemachus and Peisistratus claiming a mostly dry log to sit on. They’d found it first, so they got to call dibs. Amphinomus yanked a cushion from his backpack to sit on, Eurymachus did a Slav Squat, and Antinous simply leaned against a tree.

“So, our barista friend noted which campsite they were renting when he and his girlfriend had that encounter,” Amphinomus explained to the rest of the impromptu hiking group. “Not sure yet what it could be, if it’s anything. We’re too far south for a wen-”

“Dude!” Antinous interrupted. “Don’t say the name while we’re in the woods! You get us killed and I’m haunting your ass.”

Amphinomus scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Fine, you paranoid bastard. We’re too far south for Wendy-boys; it doesn’t get cold enough to trigger the kind of long-term starvation that could create one.”

“Maybe if they got stuck in a cave, Until Dawn style,” Peisistratus said.

“That was a mine,” Telemachus pointed out.

“Same difference.”

“Can’t discount some sort of fae. Those sneaky bastards are everywhere,” Eurymachus suggested.

“Maybe a kelpie? They like to lure people in,” Antinous said. “Let me look at the map again, see how close the campsite is to the creek.”

It was weird to hear these things discussed as if they were absolutely real, and not just hypothetical creatures that were probably the result of a case of sleep paralysis and the power of suggestion. The three podcasters go back and forth, positing different theories, different creatures.

It was Peisistratus who finally voiced that doubt.

“How are we sure there’s even anything out here?” he asked, sticking his half-empty bottle back into his backpack. He didn’t say it unkindly, nor accusatory, but mild, curious.

“We aren’t. Not in the least,” Amphinomus said. “It obviously could be a hallucination, or some sort of prank, or even a plain-old lie. That’s boring though; much more fun to go into it as if it’s real.”

“Also the listeners want it to be real,” Antinous cut in. “There’s a not-insignificant chunk of my viewership that gets all pissy when we try to inject some realism into the whole show. So, we ride the line, going into every situation as if this time, we’re totally going to prove the existence of a sasquatch or whatever. Then we find maybe some weird shit, nothing provable, still make a huge fuss of it, and go for tacos.”

“Oh fuck, it’s been forever since I had tacos,” Telemachus mumbled under his breath.

It had been a month, but when high, even a few minutes ago seemed like an eternity.

“Well, we gotta finish the trail first,” Amphinomus snorted. “Up and up, you two, we’ve got three and a half miles left.”

Peisistratus got up easily enough, and Telemachus thought he had too, until his vision dropped out from under him and he lost all sense of coordination. It wasn’t his migraines, just a temporary black-out glitch that sometimes happened. More frequently, lately, but it was still a minor inconvenience at most.

Lucky for him, Peisistratus managed to grab his arm before he wound up face-first in the freezing mud.

“I’m fine, it’s just a…whatever it is,” Telemachus groaned, planting his feet more firmly as he waited the crushing few seconds it took before the world began to fill back in. “The thing that happens. The blankening or whatever.”

Antinous had a penlight out, shining it into Telemachus’ pupils, staring intently.

“One of the blood vessels in your eye is leaking,” he said. “Just a little one, so you don’t look like you’ve become Kakashi Sensei, but it’s noticeable. Also, did you know you have eye freckles?”

“Eye freckles?” Telemachus repeated, skeptical. “No. I didn’t know that. I didn’t know those were a thing.”

“They happen sometimes; I had one on my other eye. Unrelated to how it got removed. You might want to see an eye doctor, though. Just to make sure it’s nothing weird. When I still had both, the doc checked it every year to make sure it wasn’t turning into melanoma or whatever.”

A shard of ice cut through Telemachus at that, his panic disorder rumbling at the margins and chewing his psyche, feeding the paranoia he felt at a low simmer almost always. It pulsed, even through the high that Telemachus still had buzzing through his veins, and clawed at his stomach.

Instead of giving any more thought to the panic trying to kick his kidneys into submission, he grabbed a fresh water bottle from his bag and drained it all in one long pull. The water helped ground him, remind him he was alive, not lost in the fog of terror.

“I’ll do that. Make an appointment. For now though, let’s finish the hike, eh?” he managed, crushing the thin plastic bottle and slipping it back into his backpack. Movement was good. It also helped him focus on his body and the world around it, also helped stop him from being swallowed by the annoying anxiety and/or panic attack that wanted to get him.

“You sure you’re up for it, kid?” Antinous asked, eyebrow raised.

“I’ll be fine; that happens sometimes. I think it just happens when I don’t have enough water or something,” Telemachus said with a shrug. “And my eyes are probably just bloodshot from the weed, so I wouldn’t worry too much about that.”

He dropped it, thankfully.

Peisistratus didn’t drop it quite that easily though. The second they’d been dropped off back at Telemachus’ house, he struck.

“A bloodshot eye doesn’t look the same as a leaking blood vessel,” Peisistratus informed him sternly. “Let me look.”

“Peisi, I’m fine,” Telemachus said, waving him off. “This happens all the time, you know. Sometimes my vision just decides not to work for a few seconds.”

He still let Peisistratus manhandle him, peering into his eye with a similar careful scrutiny as Antinous had. More so, even, because they were best friends after all.

“Okay, it doesn’t look bad,” Peisistratus decided. “But you’re still going to call the eye doctor. In fact, I’m giving you the number for the guy who did my laser surgery last year. Call and make an appointment now.”

“You’re just being paranoid,” Telemachus told him, very aware this was a pot-meet-kettle situation. As if, were Peisistratus not forcing the issue, he wasn’t going to never make that call, too afraid of what the doctor would say.

Because of that, he did, in fact, call and make an appointment.

“Happy now?” he asked, stuffing his phone back into his pocket. “Got an appointment in three days.”

“Very much so, yes,” Peisistratus said, a hint of smug satisfaction in his voice.

Mission accomplished, he let the subject rest as they spent the rest of the evening watching more of those parody musicals Peisistratus seemed to love, and Telemachus liked because it meant Peisistratus was having fun. When Penelope got home, they switched to watching a more conventional movie, so that she could join them and not deal with their collective theater-kid bullshit.

It was three days later. He’d left the appointment, and was sitting, staring at his cup of coffee in Purrcolate. Kaya, a sweet oriental short-hair, was purring on his lap.

As he stared, a tear drop fell into his coffee. He’d shoved himself into a corner as far away from anyone else as possible, but he had to stay quiet. He didn’t want anyone to look at him, to perceive him at all. He didn’t want anyone intruding on the miasma of self-pity, misery, and plan fear that was adrift inside of him. A tattered raft in the midst of a hurricane.

A pair of scuffed-up hiking boots clomped into his vision, though Telemachus didn’t feel like looking up to acknowledge their owner quite yet. He felt too trapped, shackled into place lest the dam burst.

“You look fucking miserable,” Antinous informed him.

“Have you ever had a spinal tap?” Telemachus asked. He’d meant to ask to be left alone, but apparently his mouth was working against what his mind wanted. That was the first thing that tumbled out.

“Can’t say I have, no. What’s wrong?”

Antinous’ voice was softer than it had any right to be, and that’s what made Telemachus finally look up, to meet his eyes.

“Apparently there’s a lot of pressure up against my optic nerves, and it’s what’s been causing my vision to blank out. They don’t know what’s causing it, but I need an MRI and a spinal tap,” Telemachus said. “Could be nothing. Could be something. Could be a brain tumor.”

Antinous sucked at his teeth in sympathy. “Yeah. That would do it.”

“It’s  probably not, though, right? I mean, I have had an MRI before, just under a year ago. A tumor would have shown up already, right? It’s probably something else, like an infection, or an allergic reaction or something. I’m probably panicking for no reason, right?”

Telemachus hated the hysterical edge his voice took on, made him feel small and fragile, and not in the fun getting-thrown-around-in-bed way that he sometimes liked. No, this was like being told your aunt, the one other person who understood what you and your mother were going through, deciding to move across the country because she didn’t believe her husband and her brother were ever going to return. Was like being a ten-year-old and finding out that, while you spent days working on a presentation for your scout troop’s culture festival, the rest of your troop had gotten together to do a single project that blew yours out of the water, without telling you.

Antinous sat down with a sigh, putting his feet up on an unoccupied crate usually meant for the cats to sit on.

“I won’t tell you that you shouldn’t be worried,” Antinous began. “Shit’s scary, absolutely. Being told you need a needle in your spine should be terrifying, else I’d worry if you were alright, mentally.”

“I’m not,” Telemachus interjected, because he felt the need like a bug burrowed under his skin.

“Right, right. Panic disorder. But, like. That’s kid’s stuff, you know? Lots of people have a panic disorder. You take your meds, you smoke your weed, it lets you live. Still sucks though, I get it. But you panic because you still care. You still want to keep living.”

Despite everything, Telemachus did. There had been a dark, long time when he didn’t, but he was getting past it. He was still so young, he knew that. Even if he had to take a handful of pills every morning and night just to feel normal enough to exist.

“Whatever it turns out to be, you’ll be fine,” Antinous said. He looked uncomfortable trying to give advice, trying to be sweet. He averted his eyes, fiddled with the hem of his sleeves, adjusted where his feet were resting. “I mean, probably.”

“You aren’t fantastic at the whole pep-talk thing,” Telemachus informed him, though it was indeed helping. It was kind of funny to watch him squirm, and it definitely distracted Telemachus from his gloom-and-doom thoughts.

Antinous let out a scoff of a laugh, rolling his eyes. Then he paused, contemplated. Chewed at the inside of his own cheek as he considered something, examining Telemachus’ face with a strange kind of scrutiny.

“I think what you need is a good distraction,” Antinous said, making up his mind about whatever it was. “We have that Airbnb still rented; Amphi and Eury are gone all day visiting that craft fair a couple towns over, so we’d get it to ourselves, if you’re interested.”

The implication was heavy in his gaze and tone, and Telemachus’ brain did a hard reboot.

“What kind of distraction did you have in mind?” he asked, just to be sure. Just to double check. His voice felt like sand. “I’m still not giving you an interview,” he added, to be funny. Just to be sure of that, too.

“No mics, no cameras,” Antinous assured him. “No clothes, unless you like keeping them on during.” That was said with a crack of a grin tugging up one side of his mouth. It was obvious as one could get without saying ‘I want to fuck you’ in the middle of a crowded café.

Telemachus knew better, was smarter than this. But he was in his head, was trapped in the wreckage and storm, and he just wanted fucking out of it.

“Okay, yeah,” he said. “Lead the way.”

Antinous’ face split in sunny triumph, leaping up and pulling Telemachus from his seat, slapping an extra ten into the tip jar as he tugged the both of them out.

Chapter Text

The man sits in a rocking chair in a small cabin. He’s hyper aware of the cracks that run down the wall, and of the steady drip, drip, of water from the leaking roof as it splashes into a bucket, but there’s not really anything he can do to fix it.

The girl sits on a stool in front of him, staring out the window as he pulls a comb through her tangled blonde hair.

He prefers her like this, quiet and childlike. When she reminds him of his own child, back at home, and when he used to brush and comb and braid for him. Even when she threw a tantrum, or screamed her laughter as she chased him through the woods that kept the rest of civilization at bay, he preferred it.

Childish is much preferable to when she gets it in her head to act like a grown woman, when she tries to play the role of wife instead. When he has to lock himself away where she can’t reach him, because she doesn’t understand what it means. She’s older than his son by a few years, but no one was ever there to teach her it’s wrong.

He wants to hate her, and the throbbing of his thrice-broken leg reminds him that he probably should, but she doesn’t know what she’s doing, not really. A girl living for years with only the graves of her family for company, who doesn’t remember anything but their twisted teachings.

He finishes the braid, dropping it to hang loose down her back.

“Thank you papa,” she says, so sweetly. So sweetly that you’d never guess the rage in her eyes as she’d brought down a mallet that should have been too big for her to lift.

“Of course, Calypso,” Odysseus tells her. His mouth wants to call a different name.

Telemachus was only having a mild panic attack, sitting cross-legged on the queen bed of an Airbnb, alone with a man he still considered his stalker. His shoes were off, but he was still dressed, because Antinous had seen what a mess the room was, and immediately got so embarrassed he had to start cleaning.

“Fucking idiots leaving their equipment everywhere,” Antinous was grumbling, shoving bits of wire and devices that Telemachus couldn’t identify into a plastic tub, then shoving that tub into the living room.

“Why would they be leaving it in your room?” Telemachus asked with a smirk.

Caught, Antinous flushed. Not a whole lot, but his cheeks went a little darker. “Not important.”

Finally the room was acceptable, and Antinous stood there, hands on his hips, as they sort of stared at each other. Telemachus gave him a little wave.

“I’m going to be so honest, I didn’t think I was gonna make it this far,” Antinous admitted, deflating a little bit.

“I didn’t think you were, either,” Telemachus said. “I’d say don’t get a big head about it, but I suspect it’s already too late for that.”

Antinous laughed, re-inflating  now that he had something to latch onto. “Confidence is key to a lot of things. Ego means better chance at success, because you believe you deserve what you want. If you never try, you never get.”

He stalked over, finally crawling onto the bed, maneuvering Telemachus so the latter was on his back underneath him, hands pressing on Telemachus’ shoulders to pin him there. It made their difference in size much more apparent, which in turn sent a shiver down Telemachus’ spine.

Antinous noticed, cocking his head to one side, smirk swiftly inching up a few notches in smugness. “You like being held down?” he asked.

“A normal amount,” Telemachus said defensively, swallowing down his nervousness as he averted his eyes.

“A normal amount?” Antinous grinned. “What would ‘a normal amount’ be?”

He slid his hands- big, warm, calloused- down, rubbing along Telemachus’ sides as he made his way down to where Telemachus’ shirt had begun to ride up, showing a sliver of skin.

“I-I don’t know. Like, it’s nice, but not fully into ‘kink I have’ territory? Look, I didn’t anticipate needing to explain myseLF-” Telemachus jumped a little when the hands made it, shoving up under his shirt and grabbing on to his waist.

“You are sensitive,” Antinous said, delighted. “Oh, we’re going to have so much fun.”

His thumbs explored the expanse of Telemachus’ stomach, eyes closing as he focused on mapping out each inch of skin with touch alone. He paused, tapping against Telemachus’ belly button.

“Navel piercing, huh? Any other surprises under here? Or should I just stop beating around the bush and find out for myself?”

“I thought it would be cute, and I thought I’d wear more crop tops than I do,” Telemachus told him defensively.

“You’re getting exactly zero complaints from me,” Antinous breathed. He shoved Telemachus’ shirt up so that he could lean down and tug the piercing between his teeth. Not hard, just enough to get a reaction from the man pinned under him. Which, it did, Telemachus sucking in a breath as his body shuddered.

Antinous yanked the shirt the rest of the way off, leaving Telemachus’ torso bare for his hungry gaze to rake across.

Telemachus was fortunate in one regard related to his gender; his parents had been supportive, and he’d been allowed to take puberty blockers from the moment he’d come to them with the news that he was pretty sure he was actually a guy. This meant that his chest hadn’t been able to grow past A-cup, and now that he was on testosterone, they hopefully never would. He didn’t even have to bind unless he was wearing something tight.

Antinous pulled back to get his own shirt off, and Telemachus tried very hard to keep his eyes in his head, because hello. He wasn’t body-builder level of muscles and abs, but he was obviously into fitness and nutrition, and obviously strong. He had a few various scars that added extra visual interest for Telemachus’ own wandering eyes to take in. What looked to have once been a pretty gnarly burn decorated one side, around the size of a hand, but shaped irregularly enough that Telemachus couldn’t tell what had made it.

He was staring, so to make sure that Antinous knew it was because he was awestruck and not horrified, he muttered out a, “I don’t think I can describe using my words how fucking hot you are.” He then promptly flushed crimson from his forehead to his chest, because that was probably a bit much.

It took Antinous off guard for a scrap of a second, but then that grin stretched across his face again.

“Oh? I thought I had a big enough ego as it was, and here you are feeding it,” he said, leaning down to rest one cheek against Telemachus’ clavicle. “I didn’t realize your freckles were going to continue down,” he added, brushing his fingers against the marks. Clearly pleased about the revelation.

Telemachus liked his freckles and moles, liked the way they drew similarities between him and his mom. He’d been her little mini-me as a kid, and though he was growing to look more like his father these days, he didn’t mind the ways he was like Penelope. Now, however, he’d like to banish thoughts of his parents and just enjoy someone else liking the freckles too.

“You good with being groped?” Antinous asked, hand hovering above one could-barely-be-called-a-tit, making a grabby motion.

“Yeah,” Telemachus breathed. It relaxed him a bit more, to know that Antinous was going to ask instead of just doing. That had been a problem with his last partner- who’d been somewhat of a chaser, too. Which is why he was an ex.

Antinous grabbed Telemachus’ chest, slotting the nipple between his index and middle finger so that he could give it a more individual squeeze, causing Telemachus to gracefully choke on his own tongue.

Telemachus didn’t usually play with them on his own accord, but it was nice to have that warm hand on him, kneading down into the muscle, firm but careful. Antinous’ other hand rested at his hip, thumb rubbing against where the bone was closest to the skin.

“How experienced are you?” Antinous asked, taking a quick second break from kissing each and every freckle and mark he could reach on Telemachus’ chest. “Gotta know how weird I can get,” he joked.

“A bit, I guess? I’ve had a few relationships, but haven’t done anything crazy, sexually. This is probably the…second craziest thing I’ve done.”

Immediately, Telemachus regretted saying that, because Antinous’ eyes lit up in a way that meant he wasn’t about to let the subject go.

“Alright, now I have to know what the craziest thing you did was,” Antinous pressed, pushing Telemachus’ hair back with the hand that had previously been at his hip.

In an embarrassed mumble, Telemachus admitted, “Okay, it’s why I stopped going to PFLAG. There was a girl I met, and we got together a few times. Wasn’t supposed to be anything emotional or whatever, just having fun. Anyway, she moonlighted as a Domme for the local kink scene, and she was supposed to be doing a demonstration of shibari when her primary partner and her broke up. So I. Uh. Stepped up. Got tied up in front of a crowd. I wasn’t naked, but I wasn’t exactly clothed, either.”

“And you got too embarrassed afterwards to see her again?” Antinous guessed.

“Nah, turns out her partner had the right of it; she was a huge asshole. She takes over those damn meetings. Poor Leander never gets a word in edgewise, and Hiro and her have practically come to blows before.”

“Did you like getting tied up?” Antinous asked against Telemachus’ throat, leaving little biting kisses along it.

“…A normal amount,” Telemachus said.

He knew it was a damned lie, and by the way Antinous huffed a laugh into Telemachus’ skin, the man knew it too.

“Oh my sweet little wolf, you don’t have to pretend for me,” Antinous crooned, giving an extra firm squeeze to Telemachus’ chest. “Though unfortunately, unless you want to get tied up with microphone wires, I don’t have the proper tools.”

The thought should not have been hot. Telemachus should not have been considering it. He eventually dismissed the idea, though it was a near thing, and he had to bite his tongue to keep from suggesting they go ahead and try it. People used specific types of rope and cord for a reason, and his body hated him enough as it was without ligature marks.

“Yeah. You’re right. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Telemachus breathed out.

“Thoughts for next time you need a good distraction,” Antinous agreed.

Telemachus didn’t know what was wrong with him that he didn’t offer even a token protest that this was firmly a one-time thing. Just bit back a moan as Antinous decided to introduce his tongue and teeth to Telemachus’ other nipple.

His own hands had been twisted into the duvet, being unsure what to do with them in his nervousness. But he was starting to relax now, so he managed to unclench them from the now-wrinkled comforter, and decided to explore the planes of Antinous’ back and shoulders. The skin was soft, the kind of softness that comes from the type of careful skin routine that Telemachus was way too impatient for. Telemachus’ fingers found the scars like homing beacons.

“Do you mind them being touched like this?” Telemachus asked, at the edge of one. Because sue him, he liked the way scars felt. Liked the way they could tell a story of healing and growth.

“Go for it,” Antinous groaned into Telemachus’ chest. “Feel free to feel me up however you like,” he added with an eyebrow wiggle that Telemachus felt more than saw.

“Ugh. You are incorrigible.”

That earned a chuckle from Antinous, followed by him licking a stripe from clavicle to jawline, causing Telemachus to squawk indignantly. Not that he stopped him. He just continued deliberately mapping Antinous’ skin with fingertips alone, feather-light touches that made the man squirm.

“Are you ticklish?” Telemachus asked, gleeful.

“No,” Antinous lied, cheeks darkening again.

For just a second, Telemachus dug his fingers into Antinous’ side, startling the man into letting out his own squawk, but quickly relented.

“Sure you aren’t,” he said smugly.

Antinous retaliated with a hard pinch to one nipple, though Telemachus liked it too much for it to really count, letting out a choked little moan.

“So sensitive,” Antinous repeated in a happy little murmur, before sucking at that same nipple. It was rapidly becoming sore, Telemachus’ thighs clenching with the thought of the reminder.

Sex was, in his opinion, best with reminders that lingered for a few days. Bite marks, soreness, the occasional bruises somewhere hidden under his clothes. Things he could let his fingers wander over to make it real, to remember that it had actually happened.

“We should probably get these off, huh?” Antinous said, hands going down to rest on Telemachus’ hips, one thumb flicking the button of his jeans.

“Yeah, definitely,” Telemachus agreed. Though, as soon as Antinous made to do so he stopped him with a startled little, “Wait!”

Antinous’ hands stopped as he looked down with a quirked eyebrow. “You okay? Getting cold feet?”

“I’m good, it’s just that. Well…try not to laugh, okay?”

“Laugh at whaaaat?” Antinous asked, that glint back in his eyes that meant he was excited about the new teasing opportunity he was about to get.

“I forgot I was wearing my packer today, and it’s…” Telemachus trailed off in his embarrassment, though he didn’t stop it when Antinous hands resumed their work getting his jeans open and boxers pulled down.

“It’s lavender,” Antinous said. “Is this…is this crochet?”

“Yeah,” Telemachus said, face buried in his hands. “I found a pattern online, and the lavender was the only yarn I could sneak away from my mom without having to explain myself; she never uses the color.”

“It’s adorable,” Antinous told him. He plucked up the yarn dick, setting it on the bedside table in a place of honor, before patting it at the head like it was a stuffed bear, not a cock. Telemachus couldn’t even call him a fucking weirdo for it, because, again, Telemachus was the one who'd had a crocheted lavender penis stuffed into his boxers.

Once it was safely out of the way, that meant Antinous then had a much less obstructed view of what he’d apparently been trying to see for around two weeks now. He liked what he saw, judging by the way his pupil dilated.

Telemachus was pretty sure he looked normal, though he liked to think about and look at it as little as possible. He liked his T-dick though; it was a couple of inches in length, just enough that it brought a bit of euphoria instead of dysphoria.

“Alright, getting these the rest of the way off,” Antinous decided, yanking at Telemachus’ pants and boxers. The latter lifted his hips to make it easier.

“For such a scrawny guy, you’ve got great thighs,” Antinous said. He grabbed one thigh in each hand, giving an appreciative squeeze.

“I w-walk everywhere, when I can,” Telemachus told him.

“Mmm, it definitely pays off.” Antinous pressed a very wet kiss to the inside of one, giving it a gentle little nibble, before he stood up to work his own pants and underwear down.

He had a fantastic dick. There was no getting around that. It was above average in size, but not enough that Telemachus didn’t think he could take it, proportional and just a little bit curved. Pretty head, for as pretty as a dick could be.

No, Telemachus was not salivating, don’t ask.

Antinous crawled back on top, pressing down until Telemachus could feel that cock on his thigh.

“Think this’ll distract you well enough?” Antinous asked. “Make that mind of yours go blank?”

Telemachus licked his lips- why they were suddenly so dry, he didn’t know- and choked out, “I’m a bit of an overthinker. Might have to try pretty hard.”

Antinous was visibly delighted, eager to rise to the challenge in Telemachus’ words. “Oh, my sweet wolf, you are a fucking treat.”

Telemachus would normally have a witty word-play joke to make about exactly the type of fucking treat, but he was still an emotional wreck from earlier, and he wanted to get that cock inside of himself, thank you very much. So, instead, he just stuck his tongue out before asking, “You do have condoms, right?”

“Wouldn’t have brought you here if I didn’t,” Antinous said. “Lube too, if we’re gonna need it.”

“We will. One of the very few things I dislike about T, it means I don’t get super wet on my own,” Telemachus grumbled.

“I suppose that also answers my question of where you wanted me to put this,” Antinous said with a chuckle, grinding against Telemachus’ thigh again. “I mean, that was your way of saying you wanted me to fuck you here, right?” he added, cupping Telemachus’ crotch, middle finger rubbing over the entrance. “What terms do you like, by the way?”

“Yeah, that’s where. And. Uh. Cunt is usually my favorite. I’m not super picky though.”

“Short and sweet, huh? I can work with that,” Antinous whispered directly into Telemachus’ ear.

The heat in Antinous’ voice went down Telemachus’ spine and straight to said cunt, which finally seemed to stand at attention and realize it was about to be needed. His dick had, thankfully, been much quicker on the uptake.

Antinous ruffled around in the bedside table for a moment, pulling out the box of condoms and a decent-sized bottle of lube. Cherry scented, according to the label. He set the latter down next to the packer, flipping the box open and fishing one of the condoms out.

Telemachus watched him roll it on, only a little bit because he wanted to make sure it was being used correctly. Mostly it was just because it was kind of hot to watch.

“Can I ride you?” was out of his mouth before the filter between Telemachus’ brain and mouth had time to catch it.

Not that Antinous looked like he minded all that much. In fact, he seemed to like that idea very much, given how quickly he propped himself up on his elbows to look over.

“And here I was, thinking I was the one supposed to be doing the work,” the man teased. “Hop up, let’s put those thighs to task,” he said, patting his lap.

“You are lucky you’re hot,” Telemachus sighed, pushing himself up so he could swing one leg over and straddle Antinous.

“You want me to get you stretched out, or do you want me to just watch?” Antinous asked, grabbing the lube from the bedside table without looking, tossing it from hand to hand to start warming it up just a smidge.

“Want you to watch,” Telemachus told him, reaching over to snatch the bottle from his hands.

He knew his body, and knew how much lube he’d really need, but he wanted to make a show of it, so added a little extra when he poured it over his fingers.

He slipped two into himself, balancing on the line between what would be fun for Antinous to watch, and what would actually get the job done. He liked a little pain with his pleasure, so he didn’t have to be too careful, just cautious enough so that he didn’t bleed.

Antinous’ eyes were fixed where the fingers disappeared inside, hungry but self-satisfied, enjoying the view. His dick twitched where it was resting against Telemachus’ ass, as eager as the rest of him.

Telemachus peered back over his shoulder to eye the size, considering, and added a third finger. Just to be safe.

He determined that he was as open as he wanted to be, and lifted up so he could scoot a little further back and get his hands on Antinous’ cock, pouring a generous amount of lube over it, giving it a few strokes to coat it evenly. And also to tease, just a little bit. He loved how hot it was underneath his hand, even through the condom, how well it fit in his hand.

Finally, he lifted up, lined himself up, and dropped down.

“Oh fuck,” he breathed. It felt bigger inside of him, and the stretch of it burned in a way that took a second to morph into the good sort of pain, that soreness that would have Telemachus thinking about this exact moment over the next few days.

He gave himself a spare few seconds before he began to move, bracing himself against Antinous’ shoulders to make it a little easier. Antinous grabbed his hips to help him out, keeping him balanced and not tipping over to one side.

It may have been too long since he’d last gotten laid, and his body was reminding him of that with each passing second, but he powered through.

“Perfect,” Antinous said, voice so soft it did something to Telemachus’ chest, something it should not have been allowed to do. “God, you feel so good. I knew you would. Knew you’d take me beautifully.”

Telemachus couldn’t really respond, too busy gasping in lungfuls of air whenever his mouth opened. They turned into needy little keens when Antinous bucked his hips up, hitting a fantastic spot dead-on. Quickly, Telemachus readjusted so that he’d hit it again each time he dropped back down.

Antinous’ eyes flicked between where their bodies joined, and up to Telemachus’ face, as if he couldn’t decide what he wanted to look at. Telemachus decided that if Antinous had enough brain power to dither about it, then Telemachus wasn’t doing a good enough job, so he intentionally clenched down. He grinned in triumph when Antinous’ head fell back against the pillow, eyes fluttering closed.

“Fuck!” Antinous panted out.

“Mhmm,” Telemachus agreed, biting his lip as he sped up a little bit more. His thighs were screaming at him, but he’d pushed them harder before- in different circumstances, sure, but exercise was exercise.

If he could keep this up, if he could prove to himself that his body was still working how it needed to, he could convince himself that whatever was wrong wasn’t killing him. That whatever the tests he’d need said, he was going to be okay. In this moment, at least, he would be okay-

“Telemachus,” Antinous barked out, gripping harder on his hips to stop him. “Hey. What’s going on? You’re crying.”

Oh. So he was. He hadn’t even realized that his vision had gone blurry and vague, and there were tracks running down his face.

“I. I just.”

Telemachus was gasping now for very different reasons. He groaned at himself in frustration, then fell forward, burying his face into Antinous’ chest.

“I’m sorry,” he sniffled, miserably.

Warm arms wrapped around him, pulling him in close and tightly.

“Slight mood killer moment, but it’s okay,” Antinous said.

Telemachus’ next apology was muffled by pecs, but Antinous seemed to understand it, because he started stroking Telemachus’ hair, nails gently rubbing down his scalp. Soothing, and gentler than Telemachus had truly expected.

“I’m so tired of being fucking sick all the time,” Telemachus admitted. “I like to work. I like going to community meetings and conventions and the fuckin Renn Faire. I like going out with Peisi and Nausicaa to just have fun and cause minor mischief. But I can’t do that, because around every corner is another migraine or panic attack to send me running back home. And my problems are still relatively mild, you know? I can walk, I can see. Run a hundred scans and you might not even see anything wrong.”

Oh. That’s what it was. Telemachus let out a breath, letting himself sink further into Antinous’ chest.

“I think I’m less worried about what the tests will find, and more worried that they won’t find anything,” Telemachus realized. “At least if I have a brain tumor they know what it is, you know? And we’ve got good insurance, so if I need an operation it won’t bankrupt us. That’s fucked up, right? Hoping it’s a tumor or something? Just so that they can point at something and say, ‘yup, here’s your problem’?”

Antinous was silent for a moment, thinking.

“No, I think that makes perfect sense,” he said. “You just want answers.”

They stayed like that for a little while, Telemachus calming down slowly but surely. Antinous’ warm hands pet him, through his hair, down his back, rubbing between his shoulder blades.

“Can we try again?” Telemachus asked, once he was pretty sure he was done crying. Antinous was still inside him, having flagged a little bit, but the intrusion twitched when Telemachus looked up to lock eyes.

“Yeah,” Antinous agreed quickly. “Let me take control though. Just focus on the moment, on what it feels like.”

He flipped them so that Telemachus was on his back underneath him, pressed firmly down. It was nice, being encompassed like that. Warm and comforting.

“Just be a good boy, and let me work.”

Telemachus shuddered at that, because damn if there wasn’t a little bit of a praise kink in him.

Okay, maybe a lot of one.

Antinous bit into the skin at his collarbone, sucking a bruise there, then a second as he pressed their hips together, thrusts slow and deliberate.

Telemachus wanted to tell him it was okay to be rougher, to go harder, but he was letting Antinous take control. His brain needed a time out until it could play nice again, so he was going to let go and let it happen if it fucking killed him.

Okay, maybe that was being a bit hyperbolic. He was at least eighty percent sure that Antinous wasn’t going to serial kill him. And dick probably wouldn’t kill him either, even if it was a stretch to get it all the way inside.

Antinous wrapped Telemachus’ legs around his waist, using the leverage to thrust deeper. Almost too deep, but Telemachus wasn’t going to complain when the spike of sorta-pain-mostly-pleasure scrambled his brain and made his vision blank out for a second. Thankfully, Antinous seemed to notice, and repeated it.

“Think you can handle more?” he asked.

Telemachus nodded somewhat manically, meeting the roll of hips with his own. Yes, please more, he didn’t say but thought so hard that it was probably impossible that Antinous didn’t get the picture.

“Sweet, needy little thing,” Antinous cooed. “I’ll give you what you need, just be patient.”

Telemachus didn’t want to be patient, but he wanted to be good, so he tried to relax, to cede any mention of control. The only tension in him was what was necessary to keep his legs where they were, tucked around Antinous, helping keep them flush together.

“Good boy,” Antinous repeated, pulling back just a little, before he slammed in, grabbing Telemachus by the shoulders to keep him in place. “Gonna lay there and take it. The second I saw you, I wanted you right here under me. Knew you would be so good for me.”

The thrusts were hard, harsh, and aimed perfectly, Telemachus grabbing onto the comforter because if he grabbed Antinous’ shoulders he’d be leaving scratches down the man’s back. All the while, Antinous was keeping up a running monologue in Telemachus’ ear, things both filthy and sweet. Telemachus was well past understanding the words, just the intention behind them, just feeling his body being rocked into the bed.

One of Antinous’ hands snaked between them to grab at Telemachus, snatching his t-dick and sending a jolt through him.

“You gotta come first,” Antinous informed him. “I have a reputation to uphold. How close are you?”

Telemachus made a noise that he hoped conveyed ‘very, especially if you keep doing that with your thumb.’ Considering that Antinous did in fact keep doing that with his thumb, it seemed the message was received.

“Good, cuz I’m not going to last much longer either. Fuck, you fit me so perfect,” Antinous groaned.

It only took a few more strokes before Telemachus saw white, legs clenching so hard, pulling Antinous so tightly against him, that they started cramping.

Antinous kept up his thrusts, chasing completion in Telemachus’ oversensitive body, dropping down to press his face against Telemachus’ throat. He sucked another mark into it as he followed Telemachus into climax, hips stilling when their pelvises were flush together.

They laid there for a while, sweaty and spent, Telemachus starting to doze under the comforting weight, cock softening inside him.

“Can we call this a successful distraction?” Antinous eventually said, rubbing against the last hickey, almost mesmerized by it.

Considering Telemachus couldn’t answer using his words, just a vague mumble followed by nuzzling into Antinous’ chest, the answer was a resounding ‘yes’.

Chapter Text

The fascinating thing about having a potentially dangerous medical problem is that they fast track you into the testing you need. Hence why it was only two days after the eye appointment that Telemachus went in for his MRI and spinal tap.

“Now just hold on tight, this shouldn’t take too long,” the tech said, presumably pressing buttons, since the machine started moving, inching Telemachus into the enclosed section.

He closed his eyes and held his breath- not actually necessary, but it made him feel a little better as he was moved around, back and forth as the scanner took pictures of his brain. The loud rapid clicks were actually sort of soothing. It was something about how he could hear that it was working, was doing its job.

“Alright, excellent,” the tech said cheerfully as the machine rolled Telemachus back out and whirled down, clicking off. “We’ll have imaging take a look while we get you prepped for the lumbar puncture,” they added as they came around to help him up off the table.

“Why is that so disorienting?” Telemachus groaned, mostly to himself, as he stood up on shaky legs.

“Loud noises plus rolling table. Hey, at least you didn’t fall,” the tech told him.

“Day’s still early,” Telemachus said, glancing at the paper medical bracelet that read ‘FALL RISK’ in bright orange letters. They added it when Telemachus mentioned he was prone to syncope when needles were involved.

He got a pat on his shoulder for his trouble, and walked back to the room where his mother waited, tapping her foot anxiously.

“Part one done?” She asked once she saw him shuffling back in.

“Yup. Now we wait for the scary part,” he sighed, hitching himself onto the bed.

The nurse who’d brought him there was nice enough to ply him with several blankets straight out of the warmer, which he quickly bundled himself under. There was just something about hospitals that made Telemachus feel freezing cold, only made worse by the gown he had to wear- one of those that opened at the back. He’d at least been allowed to keep his boxers on.

A new nurse bounced into the room, introducing herself before she started to explain the procedure.

“We will give you some topical anesthetic, where the needle has to go in,” she was saying. “People typically report that the anesthetic needle hurts more than the puncture itself. A little pinch, a little burning, but it shouldn’t be too bad. We check the fluid pressure, the color, the consistency. We’ll take enough for a sample, and if your pressure is high, we’ll take enough to get it back down to a normal range. Then we send the sample for testing, and you should have your results ready by Monday, just in time for your follow up appointment with Dr Delphi.”

“Will there be any restrictions he needs to follow for the next few days?” Penelope asked. “I imagine it takes a lot out of you.”

“As long as he doesn’t lift over fifty pounds, and doesn’t run a marathon, he should be fine to return to normal activity. You have any plans for the weekend?” the nurse asked him, busying herself around the room.

“I have work tomorrow, but otherwise I’m just going to try and relax,” Telemachus said.

“You can’t ask them to move your shift?” his mother fretted.

“Nope, the demo I’m doing is one of those static ones, where the client paid for a specific date. It’s fine, though. It’s chips. Nice and easy, not heavy at all.”

“What do you do for work?” the nurse asked.

“I hand out samples. We have the fancy title of ‘engagement specialist’, but really it might as well be ‘snack stand attendant’. Not that I’m complaining; I actually really like my job. Even if I stand there staring into space on slow days,” Telemachus said.

“Ooh, the samples are the best part of grocery shopping. I could almost make a lunch out of them,” the nurse told him. It was so simple and sincere that it made Telemachus smile, just a little bit, despite the panic rolling through him.

*

Then there were forms to fill out, side effects to be on the lookout for, and before he knew it he was being wheeled to a different room. Once more his mom had to stay behind, but he didn’t really want to have her watch as a giant needle was fitted into the space between two vertebrae, so it was no huge loss.

True to the nurse’s word, the anesthetic burned. It wasn’t unbearable or anything, but it made Telemachus tense up until the numbness finally spread.

He was arranged on his side, knees against his stomach, facing towards the screen that showed where they were scanning his back, so they could see where the needle needed to go.

“Now hold as still as possible,” said the guy with the needle- tech, nurse, doctor, Telemachus wasn’t sure. He’d been told so many names and titles by that point that his brain stopped registering them. All he did know was that he didn’t want nerve damage, so he listened to the man.

Oddly, it was sort of soothing to watch the screen as the needle slid in, easing into the space. Telemachus felt like he’d been mildly electrocuted as it did, tucked perfectly between the two bones.

“Yep, that pressure is a bit high,” the man said. “Not the highest I’ve seen, but we’ll take a few ounces of your cerebrospinal fluid to even you out.”

Telemachus had no choice but to remain silent- talking was moving, after all.

It was only a minute or so, then the needle left him, one of the nurses ready with a cotton ball and bandage to slap over the entry point. She held it firmly there for a few seconds, to make sure it stuck, waiting for his body to start the clotting process.

He had the smallest episode of syncope, feeling a little woozy and out of sorts even when the needle was gone, but he thankfully remained conscious. He was blearily also thankful they’d just rolled the entire bed in with him, so he didn’t have to try and walk back to where his mom was.

*

“Oh my god,” Penelope muttered under her breath. “You look pale.” Perhaps he got some of his anxiety from her.

“I’m always pale,” Telemachus said. “Just a little nauseous, no big deal,” he added, to soothe her maternal worry. He sat up in the bed, if just to show her that he could.

“He did great,” the nurse said. “You have to wait here a little longer to make sure there isn’t going to be any issues from the pressure change, but we’ll get you out of here as soon as we can.” She patted his knee.

Telemachus nodded, then let himself fall back against the bed. He wanted to nap, but they couldn’t let him in case he had a seizure or something.

Penelope handed him his phone- he couldn’t have it in either imaging room, of course- with a wry little grin.

“It’s been going off constantly,” she said. “I think Peisistratus is more nervous about the whole thing than I am.”

Telemachus went maybe a little red, unlocking his phone to see that yes, Peisistratus had sent approximately twenty texts in the hour he’d been apart from it.

Most of the messages were cute pics of Nausicaa’s cat Jazzercise, a large white tomcat that had no thoughts behind his green eyes, interspersed with well-wishes and the occasional bitching about his coworkers.

Peisi: I swear, if I have to tell these assholes one more time what solution to use for mopping, I’m going to drown the most annoying one in the bucket.

Peisi: Let it serve as an example.

Telemachus snickered and replied.

Tele: Regretting that promotion yet?

Peisi: Didn’t realize this would become my circus and my monkeys.

There were three texts from an unsaved number, so Telemachus opened them up to see what that was about.

Unsaved: Good luck with the needles today. Hope you get results. Amphi sends his well-wishes too. Anyway, try not to get paralyzed.

Unsaved: Would sending a sexy pic make you feel better?

Unsaved: This is Antinous BTW. In case you’ve wanted to see anyone else’s dick lately.

Tele: DO NOT. MY MOTHER IS IN THE ROOM WITH ME!

Unsaved: You can show her too, I’m not shy.

Tele: I’m blocking this number.

Telemachus was maybe having some regrets of his own. He didn’t even know how this asshole had found his number- Telemachus had certainly never given it to him.

Unsaved: I’m just playing. No sexy pics, I swear. Testing over?

Tele: Just waiting to make sure my brain doesn’t fall through my spinal column or whatever.

Unsaved: Good luck. I hear you need that to stay in place.

Back to the previous text convo, Peisistratus had sent a new message as well.

Peisi: I’m assuming things went well, since this is you and not your mom panic calling me. How’d it go?

Tele: Weird. Did you know needles to the spine feels like getting an electric shock?

Peisi: No, I did not. Good to know, though. Did it hurt?

Tele: Not really, tbh.

Peisi: Glad you got it handled instead of sitting on it for another several months and letting it get worse?

Tele: Shut the fuck up.

He was grinning, despite himself, and despite the smug tone he could practically hear coming through the message.

“Celebratory tacos?” Penelope offered, once they finally got discharged. “There’s that place we went to celebrate your birthday a few months ago.”

“Mom, you know I’ll never turn down tacos,” Telemachus said. Especially since they hadn’t actually gone for tacos after that cryptid hunt- Telemachus had honestly wanted to get out of that fucking RV at any cost, and had been minutes away from flinging himself from it while they went down the highway. Peisistratus would have jumped out right behind him.

At any rate, he was certified brain tumor free, at the very least, and that was definitely a cause for celebration tacos.

Peisistratus’ truck was outside the restaurant, and when he saw it, Telemachus glanced sharply at his mother, who grinned in a decidedly self-satisfied way.

When they got inside, Peisistratus had already gotten them a booth and ordered margaritas. The one for Telemachus was virgin, of course. The single year that separated them meant that Peisistratus could already (legally) drink, but Telemachus was stuck pretending he didn’t while in front of his mother. It was a frozen strawberry margarita, so that soothed the blow somewhat. Penelope’s was a classic one on the rocks with a salt rim, and Peisistratus had gotten a frozen mango one.

“That’s the good thing about being manager,” Peisistratus informed him when Telemachus had demanded to know why he was there and not at work. “You can just decide to leave a couple hours early if everything’s basically done anyway.”

“Lucky bastard,” Telemachus told him, pretending to swat him upside the head. They were both grinning.

Peisistratus was still in the bright pink scrub-top that was his uniform, dark auburn hair pulled into a ponytail that had seen better days. He worked as a housekeeping manager for one of the better retirement homes in the city, and ran the department with an iron fist.

They were halfway through their tacos when someone new entered the restaurant, and Peisistratus, the one facing the door, heaved a sigh as his expression darkened.

“Incoming dumbassery,” he mumbled to Telemachus.

It was the three podcast bros, Amphinomus and Eurymachus being loud and shoving each other while Antinous flirted with the poor hostess trying to find them a table.

“Nowhere near us, not near us,” Telemachus whispered under his breath, hiding his face behind the drink menu.

Penelope fully put her head down on the table, blocking herself from view with their water glasses and her own margarita glass. “If we stay very, very still, they might not notice us,” she said.

Telemachus slid his mostly empty glass into place to hide her better. “Like a T-rex,” he agreed.

They were seated in the next booth over, right behind Telemachus and Penelope. If Telemachus wanted to, he could have slammed his head back and head-butted Antinous.

Just when he thought maybe the trio hadn’t noticed them, Telemachus got a message.

StalkerDouche: (Telemachus had saved the number) Aren’t you a bit too old to have your mommy supervising your dates?

Tele: ???? Celebratory taco night, asshole. No brain tumor, and my cerebral cortex didn’t explode or whatever. Of course Peisi is gonna celebrate with us, he’s the one who strong armed me into going to the doc in the first place.

StalkerDouche: Aww, glad you have such a concerned boyfriend. Does he know?

Tele: 1) Not my boyfriend, 2) Know about what?? My health problems? Because yes, we’ve been bros for at least ten years.

The little dots that indicated typing came and went several times. Telemachus elected to ignore it and went back to prodding Peisistratus to tell his funny old people stories.

He was midway through talking about a woman from the dementia wing biting a nurse- nurse deserved it- when the next text finally came in.

StalkerDouche: Huh. Thought you two were actually dating. You know he likes you, right?

Except Telemachus didn’t really register that final sentence, because he was too busy being pissed off about the first one’s implications.

He but his tongue and politely waited for Peisistratus to finish his story, laughed, then turned around to glare at Antinous.

“I’m not a fucking cheater,” he said, gripping the back of the booth so hard he almost dented the vinyl.

“What about shibari girl?” Antinous shot back.

“Mom, can you pretend to not hear what I’m about to say?” Telemachus asked Penelope.

“You’re an adult that can do what you want, and I already know what shibari is,” Penelope said, though she did cover her ears. Indulgently.

“Thank you.” He turned back to Antinous. “Shibari girl was poly. Her partner was frequently there, and always knew what we were getting up to. He made me cookies once, actually. I. Am not. A cheater. If you find yourself disappointed by that, then fuck right on off.”

With that, he finished his last bite of taco, and turned back around.

“Wait, is ‘shibari girl’ Sophia?” Peisistratus asked. He seemed to be calculating something else, but whatever it was he was considering, he didn’t tell Telemachus.

“Unfortunately,” Telemachus told him.

“You need better taste in people, dude,” Peisistratus said, though he said it while trying to suppress a grin, so he didn’t seem all that serious. His eyes flicked to Antinous for a fraction of a second before going back to Telemachus.

“I knowwww,” Telemachus whined. “I didn’t realize she was going to be insane. I was just excited that a six-foot-tall goth girl was interested in me.”

“Am I supposed to still be pretending not to listen to this?” Penelope asked.

“You can listen again, thank you mom,” Telemachus said, face fully introduced to his own palm.

It was late that night, Telemachus staring up at his ceiling, that he finally had to pay the piper.

Peisi: So. Are you dating your stalker now?

Telemachus groaned, shoving a pillow over his face.

Tele: Not dating. Super not dating. It was a one-time thing cuz I was emotionally compromised and he offered to help distract me.

Several seconds of typing, followed by a deceptively short message.

Peisi: Was he any good?

Tele: WHSJDJFIEJ WHY IS *THAT* YOUR QUESTION???

Peisi: Because I have it on good authority that your head was recently examined, so it can’t be brain damage.

Tele: …Yeah, he was. Nicer than I expected. But seriously, one-time thing.

Peisi: Good. I mean, good that you had fun, but also good you realize it could have ended bad. I mean, did you see the size of the knife he had when we went on that hike?

Tele: He had a knife?

Telemachus realized as soon as he sent it that it was a bad idea.

Peisi: YOUR OBSERVATION SKILLS SUCK. HOW HAVE YOU NOT BEEN KIDNAPPED BEFORE?

Tele: My parents are terrifying and would have burned any kidnappers into the ground?

Peisi: DUMB LUCK IS HOW. I AM THIS CLOSE TO PUTTING A TRACKER ON YOU. JESUS CHRIST.

Peisi: I mean yeah, your parents are scary too. Especially your mom. You’re still tempting fate though, being alone with some guy who’s obsessed with your family. What if this is some twisted way he’s trying to insert himself into the narrative?

Peisi: Please ignore the innuendo.

Tele: Am I the narrative?

Tele: Too late, innuendo remarked upon.

Peisi: Just. Be careful, man. You’re my best bro, and I don’t want you to be just another subject for true crime dipshits to ponder over as if they actually cared.

A few minutes of typing notifications going on and off again.

Peisi: I’ve got to go to bed, work starts early. Sleep well, Tele. BFFFLs?

Tele: BFFFLs. Nighty night, don’t let your roommate bite.

Peisi: :p

Chapter Text

Odysseus remembered his first meeting with Penelope like a well-worn letter. He thought about it so often that it was soft around the edges, almost mythical, almost like fate was whispering in his ear.

He joined the military straight out of high school, and started wracking up promotions like they were candy almost immediately. So it was with no small amount of hubris that he showed up to the military gala, head full of thoughts about trying to sweep a very specific girl off her feet.

The men in his unit had been talking up Helen Leda for weeks, and Odysseus wanted to know what the fuss was about. He’d dated a bit in his teen years, but no one had ever really struck him as someone he could build a life with, and that was important to him, even as young as he was. So, when everyone started whispering about the beautiful, funny, capable girl who worked in communications, he thought that maybe he could try his hand at a bit of flirting at least.

Helen was already quite tipsy at that point of the night, though she hid it well behind a coy grin and a sense of humor. Ody was one of several men who were by her side, listening to her stories and laughing along, occasionally plying her with another drink when her glass ran empty. She’d shove it at whoever was closest, asking them to please be a dear, and they’d be off, running to the bar.

She was inoffensively pretty- blonde, heart-shaped face- the kind of girl you’d see peering at you from the pages of a fashion magazine, except that she had professed that that kind of life would have been unimaginably boring for her. Hence the military career. There was maybe a tiny spark, enough that Odysseus considered asking more seriously for her number, when the scene was interrupted.

“Do we have to cut you off?” laughed a voice soft as ash, warm as the embers underneath.

Helen’s eyes brightened. “Oh come on, don’t you know how to let loose for once? Boys, this is my cousin, Penelope. She’s here to rescue me from myself, I believe.”

Penelope stepped into the circle, grabbing Helen’s drink from her and downing it. “These are pretty strong, how are you still coherent?” she asked with another laugh, rich and vibrant.

Standing there was a girl that made Odysseus physically weak at the knees.  Resplendent in a dark blue dress, dark hair pulled into a simple yet elegant bun. She had a face full of freckles and moles, her mouth crooked into a lopsided grin as she set one lean-muscled arm over Helen’s shoulders. Her eyes- god, her eyes- were every shade of brown and gold at once, scanning the room and its inhabitants like she was planning a report on it all. She had him searching his mental dictionary for words that could come close to describing her, and he swallowed hard, lest he say something tragically embarrassing.

Those sharp, burning eyes met his, and they sparked with interest.

Soon, the both of them were making excuses to go off in the same direction, totally-not-on-purpose ending up at the same place by the snack table. They talked the rest of the night, orbiting around each other with easy conversation and way too many tiny plates of fancy meats and cheeses.

“I partly joined to keep my cousin out of trouble,” Penelope had joked, biting down on a mini sandwich and yanking out the toothpick with no small amount of relish. “But she’s got a pretty hard head, and training did help her finally learn to defend herself. We got assigned to different specialties, anyway, so we don’t interact as much as I’d like.”

“I think about half the men here would kill for her,” Odysseus commented.

“Would you?” she asked, eyes owlish and glittering. She leaned in with something of a smirk, and Odysseus knew he was being pressed.

“Well, in the sense that I’d want to protect any fellow soldier,” he answered as magnanimously as possible. “Except the bastards. Like Agamemnon, who I really thought would have failed out by now.”

“Oh! I’ve heard about him. He and Helen’s sister, Clytemnestra, have been sneaking around for a few months now. She’s been thinking about breaking it off though.”

And so it went. By the time the event space kicked them all out, Odysseus had her number written onto his hand in sharpie, and still had a little lipstick on one cheek from a quick goodnight kiss.

As military personnel are wont to do, they were married in less than a year. It was a few more years later that Penelope surprised him with a positive pregnancy test, and she had to move to a desk job, and wasn’t able to do field work anymore.

“You better be worth it,” she would say, patting her growing stomach. It was through video call most of the time, but he got leave twice before the birth to attend important appointments, and to marvel at the tiny itty bitty thing shown in the sonograms.

Holding his child- the second to do so, after Penelope herself- he could confidently say he thought it was worth it. Judging by the besotted grin on Penelope’s face, she thought so too.

Odysseus woke up with a smile, a rarity these days, as he let his eyes stay shut, listening to the rain against the tin roof.

“You seem pretty happy this morning,” Calypso said, watching him from a rocking chair with the intensity of a cat.

The smile slid away from his face, water through a colander.

“I was,” he said, as he tried very hard not to cry.

A few hundred miles away, in a very different context, someone said the same thing to Telemachus.

“You seem pretty happy this morning,” noted his manager, Aphrodite.

Well, actually, it was probably her sister Venus. They were identical twins, and sometimes Venus would come in to cover when Aphrodite didn’t want to work her shift. Telemachus could only really tell because Venus was a lot more serious and quiet. Comparatively, of course.

No, Venus was not actually an employee, but no one could prove the twins had switched, so no one said anything.

“Honestly, I’m feeling pretty good,” Telemachus told her, chipper. Aside from his back being sore, and maybe being a little tired, he felt better than he had in ages. His head barely hurt, his ears seemed to work better, and even his vision had less static or visual weirdness than he was used to.

He was loading up his demo cart for the day in record time. He even remembered his scissors, which he forgot about half the time, and he’d written the date right the first try. (They did it the European way, day/month/year, instead of the way Telemachus was used to doing it for the first twenty years of his life.)

“I think today’s gonna be a really good day.”

“Well, go sell your chips then,” Venus/Aphrodite said with a fond little chuckle.

“No team huddle?” he asked, just to be sure. Sometimes both twins had the habit of letting everyone get about halfway to the floor before declaring they all needed to come back for some announcement or the other.

“Remember to smile, fill out your cleaning log, and drop the brand name as often as you can,” she shrugged. “Go team.”

“Go team,” he agreed as he wheeled the cart out.

The chips were easy to find. They were made out of various different root veggies, not just potatoes, so they were considered a special item that got to be in a prominent place at the end of an aisle. He set a few bags on the shelves at the front of the cart, stuck a dozen or so on the inside for use in the demo, and set out his fatigue mat and trash can. He sprayed the cart top down with disinfectant, wiped it off, and it was ready to start.

That done, he got out the soufflé cups, the tray, and the napkins. Gloves on, he gave the napkins a little twirl so they’d be fanned out all pretty, and set about loading the cups with chips, setting them on the tray. Then, he changed gloves, marking down the time on his cleaning log. Technically he didn’t have to for the first clean of the day, not since the pandemic policies ended, but he always liked to anyway. Made it easier to remember when it was time to disinfect again.

He smiled, he offered the chips, he made jokes, and he dropped the stupid fucking brand name, dozens and dozens of times. He cleaned when it was time, but also when there were too many crumbs, or too much salt. It was monotonous, Sisyphean, but he liked it anyway.

During the dips, when no one was coming by the cart, he’d sketch on a napkin, or do some of the less obtrusive physical therapy exercises that were supposed to help keep his ankle joints from spontaneously giving out on him. His manager waited to come by for a picture- proof that the demo actually ran when they said it did- until he was fairly busy, meaning he had to notch his smile up further, and mention the brand a few more times than was probably natural.

The chips were pretty good. One of the vegetables that made them was parsnips, which Telemachus loved. He could only try a few chips- and only when no customers were around- but he was contemplating buying a bag to have with his lunch. Well, not the whole thing, the bag was huge, and he wanted to save some for his mom.

“So this is where you scuttle off to a few days a week,” said a devastatingly familiar voice.

“Hello Antinous,” Telemachus groaned. “Finally managed to follow me here?”

“Nah, came to do some grocery shopping,” Antinous said with a laugh, grabbing a cup of chips. “Just good luck, I guess.”

“Well, please feel free to go back to your shopping. Unless you want to buy a bag of Starches Assorted Veggie Chips With Sea Salt, baked in small batches, limited time only.”

Telemachus was laying the customer service voice on thick, trying to get across to this man very quickly that he was at work, doing his job, please don’t fuck this up for him.

“Jesus Christ, your voice goes up like three octaves when you do that.”

“They’re on sale for two dollars off the normal asking price, $3.64 down from $5.64. This sale lasts until the thirteenth, so you can always come back for them if you decide you want them later.”

“Does that actually work on people?” Antinous asked.

“More than you’d think. Eat the chips.”

Antinous ate the chips. He put a bag in his cart.

“Only because there are parsnips in here,” he grumbled, flushing a little bit.

“The parsnips are my favorite too,” Telemachus nodded. “The sweet potato ones are also pretty good. I used to get the brand that was just sweet potato chips, but then they stopped selling them in the big bags.”

“What time do you normally get off?” Antinous asked.

“Not telling you that, I don’t want you and the Wizard Van waiting outside to kidnap me or whatever.”

“Ha! Come on, if I was going to kidnap you, I’d have done it way earlier. What would I gain by waiting?”

“Plausible deniability,” Telemachus informed him. “Waiting until I let my defenses down enough to not be suspicious when you scoop me into the back and really do tie me down with those electrical cords. You’d have me halfway back to Minnesota before I realized something was wrong. Hence, my defenses are staying up.”

“You’ve thought a lot about this,” Antinous said, after a long pause.

“Listen, when some new true-crime, missing-411 podcaster bro pops into town, I make a point to listen to a few episodes. Just to know what I’m dealing with. What I’ve learned is that humans can be pretty depraved, and I don’t want to end up at the wrong side of the bottom of a cliff, you know?”

“You know, that’s fair,” Antinous admitted. “However, I was more meaning, you’re still thinking about getting tied up.”

Telemachus went spectacularly red. “Please don’t. Not while I’m at work!”

“You started it.”

“Not on purpose!”

To Telemachus’ great relief, when Antinous was done laughing at him, the man continued on to finish his grocery shopping.

“So, the name is a little scary, but I promise you the condition is easy to treat,” Dr Delphi told Telemachus, situating a pair of transitions lenses up further on his nose.

The doctor was rather young looking, maybe mid-thirties with curly blonde hair, and he had a rather soothing presence.

“The older name for it is Pseudotumor Cerebri, and the name we use more often is Idiopathic Intercranial Hypertension. It’s when the brain makes too much spinal fluid, causing a pressure buildup in the brain. Yours was affecting your optical nerves, causing the vision weirdness and some minor capillary damage. Usually we see it in women, and even then only in overweight women.”

Which meant that Telemachus was in the position of medical mystery again, which he hated. At least he had a name for the problem, but what had screwed his body up?

“I am transgender, in case that changes things. I think I put it on my intake paperwork,” Telemachus said.

“It was. According to your bloodwork though, your hormones are at the typical male levels. There are maybe a small handful of trans men in the country with the condition. Ten or so. Speaking of, I took a little look through your medical history, and it says you’ve been on the same brand of allergy medication for the last three years?” the doctor asked.

Telemachus nodded. He was too nervous to speak.

“Well, there’s the problem then. The corticosteroids in this particular brand must not mesh well with your system. I can send this along to your GP, and have them switch you to a different brand. We can monitor things to see how you react. Meanwhile, to treat your IIH, I’m putting you on Diamox, a strong diuretic. Given we found it before any permanent damage was done, you should only need to be on the meds for a year or so, then I’ll taper you down over the next year. Going off them completely could bring a resurgence, and we don’t want that.”

The doctor gave Telemachus the rundown on a longish list of possible side effects, and called in the prescription to the pharmacy in the grocery store Telemachus worked from. Finally, he was let loose with a follow-up appointment set for two months.

He meandered, stunned, into the parking lot, staring down at the pamphlet he’d been handed about his condition. The condition that had a name, and a treatment plan.

Peisistratus’ ancient truck pulled into the lot, and it had barely come to a stop before Telemachus was flinging himself through the open driver’s side window, pulling Peisistratus into a tight, wild hug.

“I have an answer for once, Peisi,” he laughed with no small amount of relish.

Peisistratus wrapped his arms around Telemachus just as hard, squeezing him with a grip that seemed to tremble.

Eventually they let each other go, and Telemachus got in on the passenger side.

Peisistratus seemed rather rumpled, more than what he’d get from a flying tackle hug from Telemachus. His hair was rucked up like he’d spent an hour ruffling his hands through it, and one of the buttons on his shirt was missing. The shirt’s collar was popped up, the topmost button done like he was trying to strangle himself with it.

“Are you okay?” Telemachus asked.

“I’m fine, just fine,” Peisistratus answered with a bit of a squeak, face pink. He at least seemed nervous and embarrassed about something, not scared or anxious, so Telemachus was reasonably sure that whatever it was that had happened, it wasn’t a bad thing.

“Can we stop by the store? I’ve got a new prescription to pick up,” Telemachus asked, excited.

“Sure. Didn’t expect to see you so excited about another pill you gotta remember to take,” Peisistratus joked.

With another wide grin, Telemachus explained everything as they made their way to the store.

Pills picked up, and the first dose taken, they settled down on Telemachus’ couch to watch more horror-comedy musicals. If Peisistratus seemed especially affectionate- tugging Telemachus into his side and resting his chin on Telemachus’ shoulder- then neither of them commented on it.

It wasn’t that odd, and saying they hadn’t (completely platonically, head out of the gutter Tele-) snuggled like that before would be a lie. They’d shared beds and sleeping bags plenty of times over the years, and it never meant anything but that they were two slightly touch-starved boys who managed to avoid the background radiation of toxic masculinity.

If he was being completely honest with himself, it was one of the biggest reasons Telemachus had never stuck to his nerves long enough to actually confess. He was scared that, if Peisistratus turned him down, they would no longer feel comfortable being so touchy-feely and affectionate. So would end couch-and-junk-food nights, curled up in each other’s orbits.

Peisistratus stayed for dinner, helping Telemachus clean up after before they headed to Telemachus’ room to play video games together, where finally, the subject came back around.

“So,” Telemachus began, moving his teifling cleric up to cast a spell over the party, which consisted of his character, Peisistratus’ dwarf monk, and two of the npc companions. “What had you so discombobulated earlier? Also, I can fix that button for you if you still have it.”

Peisistratus nearly yeeted his laptop across the room, but managed to grab it before it went fully airborne.

“W-well. Um. There’s. Here’s the thing…”

Peisistratus was violently red in the face, and deliberately not looking anywhere near Telemachus, who was staring at him intensely, not letting him flounder away from the truth.

“I made the exact dumb decision I was lambasting you for a few days ago,” Peisistratus admitted.

“There’s a lot of stupid decisions I’ve made in recent history,” Telemachus said, though he could only think of one that would leave someone that level of disheveled, because he’d been that rumpled up too.

“I slept with Antinous,” Peisistratus finally admitted, fully through his hands, as if he was trying to hide from the reality of it.

Telemachus very carefully set his laptop to the side, making sure it was secure on the bed, and then proceeded to double over, laughing his ass off.

“It’s not that funny,” Peisistratus said, slowly removing his hands to glare at Telemachus, though there was no real heat to it.

“Wait. Wait. Waitwaitwait. Did you just get curious when I said he was good at it?”

“Maybe a little? But like. He was the one to ask,” Peisistratus insisted, somewhat defensively. “I came by earlier today to drop off some lemon bars Leander brought to PFLAG last night, and he was skulking around as usual. I went to give him a piece of my mind, then one thing led to another and I don’t know, we fucked in the back of the RV.”

“Rookie move. Should have insisted on going back to the Airbnb, “ Telemachus told him.

“You seem remarkably calm about this,” Peisistratus said.

“Why wouldn’t I be? I mean, just because I fucked the guy once doesn’t mean I’m gonna be weird. I don’t like jealousy anyway, it’s annoying to feel, and no one has any fun with it. I’m not dating him or anything anyway, so like, what purpose would that serve? Unless you feel like he pushed you into something you didn’t really want, in which case I’ll take one of my dad’s old butterfly knives to his urethra.”

“No, he didn’t push me. It was. It was fun,” Peisistratus admitted, blush renewing again.

“Good. I don’t have any idea how to use a butterfly knife, and I’m not sure how we’d hide his body from the cops.”

After a moment of consideration, Telemachus had one more question.

“Who topped?”

Chapter Text

Several hours previous.

The lemon bars had been delivered, and Penelope made a point to ruffle Peisistratus’ hair and say how glad she was that her son had such a great friend, and would he like to have dinner with them once he picked Telemachus up from the doctor? To which Peisistratus assured her that he would, of course, love to.

It was as he was making his way back to the truck that he spotted that stupid RV parked three houses down, the annoyingly familiar hand waving out the driver’s side window, and something sort of just…snapped.

Peisistratus considered himself a pretty calm person, if a bit of a worrier. But not now. Now, he marched to the vehicle, spine so straight that it crackled, hands shoved into his pockets to keep them from shaking in the February air. Antinous already had the window open, so there was nothing impeding the tiny red-haired machine of rage barreling towards him.

Yet. When he reached the window, glaring up at Antinous with a glare so intense it made his own eyes feel hot, Peisistratus couldn’t decide what he wanted to say. There were so many things he could say, so many things he thought about screaming into the older man’s face.

How dare you put your stalkery hands on my best friend? What are your intentions with Telemachus? Why are you here, alone, when he isn’t even home? Did you take advantage of his emotional state? Do I have to beat you with my bare hands?

(Did you treat him like he deserves?)

“Cat got your tongue?” Antinous eventually asked, as they stared at each other for an uncomfortably long amount of time.  He was leaned partly out the window, resting his chin on the palm of his hand as he blinked lazily down at Peisistratus.

“I’ve got questions I need to ask you,” Peisistratus said, hands clenched so hard into fists in his coat pocket that he felt his nails punch into his palm.

“I’m all ears for you, boy scout. Tell me what you want to know.”

Peisistratus decided he may as well get the most important question out of the way.

“Did you coerce Telemachus in any way? I know he was in a vulnerable spot, scared, and you just so happened to be there to offer a dick in that trying time?”

Antinous sighed. “No. I offered to provide a distraction, and he took me up on it. I only asked the once, I never pushed anything. If it helps, I checked in a few times to make sure things were still copacetic. My mom may not have raised me all that much, but she did drill that shit into my head.”

Peisistratus nodded, accepting the answer. There was something honest in Antinous’ tone, and Peisistratus found himself believing it.

“I’ve gone to a lot of therapy over the years, you know,” Antinous admitted. “I was a terror as a teenager, with an even worse ego problem than I have now. Thankfully, I had teachers that cared enough to have me assessed, to do something with the rage and the delusions of grandeur. If I hadn’t gone to that therapy, I would be exactly the kind of person you keep expecting me to be, I will admit. But I’m not.”

“It’s not even really you as a person,” Peisistratus said. His own admission. “It’s just that you and your two buddies are the latest in a huge crowd of people who’ve shown up, tearing the fragile peace that Telemachus and Penelope have fought to cultivate into shreds. Dozens and dozens of people who don’t give a shit about them. One even did try to hurt Telemachus. Someone tried to kidnap him freshman year.”

Peisistratus stopped talking. That was something he hadn’t meant to divulge. One of the worst days of his very short life- though it had undoubtedly been worse for Telemachus- and he’d given the information right up on a silver platter.

Telemachus had always been small for his age, gender shenanigans be damned, and that led to a lot of people thinking they could get away with anything as long as Peisistratus wasn’t there. Sure, they were around the same size, but Peisistratus had been something of a terror in high school, and that went double when it came to protecting Telemachus. In fact, it was when Peisistratus had been suspended for a week that the bastard who tried to take him made his move.

Tele walked home from school alone that day, and was only a block from his house when the car pulled next to him, with a man saying that he had secret information about what had happened to his father, where that plane had gone down. And Telemachus, already wary but so wanting to believe, had drawn close enough that the man could grab his wrist and try to pull him in through the window. Telemachus kicked out, lashed out, tried to pull away, but it was Penelope who, watching from the kitchen window, launched herself from the house and towards the car, breaking the man’s nose.

It all happened so fast that Telemachus hadn’t really registered everything, even as he’d recounted it that night to Peisistratus, tucked into his side as he shook. Penelope had decided her and Telemachus needed to spend the night at Peisistratus’ parents’ house, after they’d talked to the police. Which meant that Telemachus was technically supposed to be in a sleeping bag with some extra blankets for cushioning, but in reality Peisistratus had immediately offered to just share the bed once the parents were all asleep.

(They got caught in the morning, obviously, but they had their clothes on and made a huge fuss about ‘ew, no, we’re just friends’, so nothing ever came from it. Eventually their collective parents just gave up.)

Antinous gave a low whistle. “Yeah. That would do it. I think I remember hearing something about that, but I wasn’t into this shit back then, so I never looked into it more. Probably should have when I did come here, but hindsight is 20/20 and all that. At least it explains why he’s constantly worried I’m about to kidnap him.”

He added, after giving Peisistratus an examining look, “I’m not going to, by the way. Maybe one day you’ll believe that.”

“Maybe,” Peisistratus shrugged.

“I do like Telemachus, I’ll have you know,” Antinous said. “He’s interesting to talk to, even if half the time he’s snapping at me like a disgruntled Chihuahua.”

Okay, Peisistratus probably shouldn’t have laughed, but the image was so vivid in his head that it caught him way off guard.

Antinous seemed to take it as encouragement to keep going, a small grin quirking up one side of his face. “I think you’re probably closer to, like, a corgi.”

“Is that a short joke?” Peisistratus asked, though he did not come across as deadpan as he wanted. Because it was an accurate read, and he wasn’t above finding the humor in it.

“It’s a ‘you would make a very attentive herding dog’ joke. But yes, you’re also very short.”

Peisistratus flipped him off. Antinous stuck his tongue out.

“I’ll bite your heels, don’t fucking test me,” Peisistratus snarked at him. “You’d make a terrible sheep though.”

“Because I’m a Cane Corso,” Antinous said. “I also herd all my friends, but I’m bigger.”

“Yet more susceptible to hip dysplasia,” Peisistratus noted.

“I think we’re getting too lost in the dog metaphors. You know a lot about different breeds?” Antinous asked, seeming genuinely interested.

“Nausicaa, my roommate, she loves dogs. She makes me watch agility shows with her, and I guess I’ve picked a few things up,” Peisistratus shrugged. “You?”

“My dad worked for the AKC, and sometimes he kept show dogs. But his were more about looks than agility. I was supposed to go into grooming and doing shows too, but then the podcast took off and I got the fuck out of town,” Antinous said. “If I never have to blow-dry another malamute, I will die a happy man.”

“That sounds never ending.”

“It was,” Antinous confirmed with a deep, deep sigh.

“Listen,” Peisistratus began, “I don’t think you and your buddies are really going to get anything new about the case out of Tele or Penelope. They’ve scrubbed through every detail they could possibly think of, and none of it has helped them locate Odysseus. The government couldn’t find him, what makes you guys think three dudebros in a van could figure it out?”

“Well, that’s the thing; I don’t think the government really tried. I mean, huge chunks of his service record are redacted. Who knows what kind of shit he saw as a general? Maybe they just wanted him out of the way once he’d retired. Eury has this whole theory about them sabotaging that plane, and how it might relate to the Leda Incident. He retired right after that mission, he must have seen something.”

“He lost his best friend on that mission,” Peisistratus told him. “They had bad intel, walked right into an ambush. I remember my dad talking about it.”

“We think there might be more to it,” Antinous said simply. “And we think they’re watching the Laersons, in case Odysseus ever told his family something. There’s a reason we’ve stuck around town so long, and it’s not just because we’re waiting for a camping reservation for Devil’s Den. Though it is also partially that.”

“You’re all insane,” Peisistratus informed him.

“Maybe. But maybe we’re right. And if we are, well…I don’t want Telemachus caught up in something just because of who his dad was. Or is, I guess.”

Peisistratus must have made some kind of expression, because Antinous added, “He doesn’t deserve that. The government doesn’t care about collateral damage if they can get away with it.”

As much as Peisistratus didn’t want to admit it, Antinous was right about that.

“Look, just don’t break his heart, okay? Or your own. He doesn’t really do relationships. If you’re expecting to woo him or something, you’re barking up the wrong tree.”

“I don’t really do relationships either,” Antinous said. “I mean, if there’s anyone I’d break that streak for it would be him, but he’s not gonna go for me when he’s so obviously smitten with you.”

Peisistratus averted his eyes.

Antinous cocked his head to the side, eyebrows furrowed a bit. “You don’t look like that was a revelation.”

“It’s not,” Peisistratus said with a swallow.

“So why aren’t you two dating, then?” Antinous questioned. “If you’re about to say you don’t feel that way back, then I’m going to call bullshit.”

“It’s just. It’s complicated, okay?” Peisistratus said with a forced nonchalance. “Like I said, he doesn’t do relationships, and I’m one of those people that doesn’t do casual.”

“Maybe you’d be his exception.”

“And if I’m not, I ruin the friendship forever,” Peisistratus snapped. He shivered a bit, pulling his coat tighter around himself.

“Get in here before you freeze to death,” Antinous sighed, unlocking the door that lead to the back of the RV from the driver’s control panel. “I’ve got hot chocolate on the stove if you want some.”

Peisistratus got in, and accepted the mug of hot chocolate that Antinous shoved into his hands.

“How… Ugh, I feel like a moron for even asking this, but how did you even get up the courage to ask him out?” Peisistratus asked.

“I didn’t think so hard about it. Just did,” Antinous said. “You’re working against yourself, you know. You and him both are overthinking constantly. I mean, he’s got a medical reason, so what’s your excuse?”

“I took the boy scout motto way too seriously, except I’m only always prepared for the worst-case scenario,” Peisistratus said, somewhat dryly.

After a long, considering moment, watching Peisistratus sip from the mug, Antinous seemed to come to a decision.

“I think we should hook up.”

“W-what?” Peisistratus sputtered, barely keeping his grip on the hot chocolate. “Why is that your conclusion?”

“Sex isn’t this force of life-ruining like you seem to think it is,” Antinous said. “What if I can prove to you that, even if you two did decide to fuck, it doesn’t necessarily mean the friendship is ruined? I mean, the queer community is already pretty small. I’m friends with plenty of my exes. Amphinomus and I dated in high-school, and we’re still good enough friends that I haven’t tried to murder him for his abysmal shower habits.”

After a few more moments, Peisistratus staring at him, he added, “Also you’re cute. I think we’d have fun.”

Peisistratus tossed back the rest of the hot chocolate and slapped the mug down onto the table.

“You know what? Fine. I can’t say I wasn’t curious. Just. I’m rusty, alright? So don’t hold it against me if I’m not great at it.”

“You need better self confidence. Are you in therapy at all?”

“No. And yes, I’m painfully aware I should be. The nursing home’s insurance sucks though, and I can’t afford it.”

“Ah, America. The disappointment that keeps on disappointing,” Antinous said, shaking his head.

So, that was basically what lead up to Peisistratus, coat tossed who knows where, on his knees in between Antinous’ legs as the man reclined on the RV’s bed, fumbling with the zipper of his pants. It was the one thing Peisistratus was confident he could do well- he may have gotten a bit of a reputation in high-school, and it may have been well deserved.

“When did you last get checked?” Peisistratus asked, working the jeans down before starting on Antinous’ boxers. “I don’t really like doing blow jobs with a condom in the way, but, you know, safety.”

“Relatively recently, about a month or so ago. Condom broke on me. It was all negative, thank fuck. I haven’t done anything unprotected since. Yourself?”

“Two weeks ago. Went in for a yearly checkup, decided to get a panel done just in case. Also all negative.”

Then Peisistratus’ hands were on Antinous’ cock, carefully guiding it from mostly soft to mostly hard, watching in rapt fascination as it grew. He leaned forward to give it a teasing little kiss right on the head, flicking his eyes up to watch Antinous’ face. It was his second favorite part about blow jobs, watching how people looked when they were getting blown.

Peisistratus kissed down the shaft, holding it against his cheek as he worked his way to the base, before licking all the way back to the tip. He ran his tongue along the vein on the underside, coaxing it just a little harder. Antinous grabbed onto his hair, but wasn’t pulling or pushing, just petting.

He pulled just the head into his mouth, admiring the texture difference between where it ended and the shaft began, running his tongue along the seam. A drop of pre-come slipped out, and Peisistratus gave a happy little sigh. He used to hate the taste back when he’d given his first bj, almost retched when his at-the-time boyfriend came. It was not helped by the fact that, when Peisistratus had asked for something to drink afterwards, to get the taste out of his mouth, the only thing his ex had in the house was diet fricking Pepsi. It was almost worse. Now, though, he’d grown to really like it.

Come, not diet Pepsi. He still couldn’t stand the latter.

Antinous had his eyes shut, relaxed, a pleased little grin tugging at the corner of his mouth as Peisistratus took more into his mouth. His jaw fell open with a small, mostly silent gasp when his cock hit the back of Peisistratus’ throat, but Peisistratus didn’t stop. He swallowed around it, getting more and more in.

“Don’t strain yourself,” Antinous warned. Peisistratus ignored him; he was fine.

Peisistratus sank down all the way, maintaining eye contact once Antinous popped his eyes back open, surprised with how quickly his dick was vanishing down Peisistratus’ throat. He paused there for a moment, grabbing one of Antinous’ hands and pressing it to his neck, letting him feel how far down the cock was. He gave the hand a couple pats, to indicate that Antinous should leave it there, and resumed moving.

“Fuck,” Antinous said eloquently, as Peisistratus pulled back to just the head, giving it a few more kisses and licks before he was diving back down, a little faster this time. Antinous’ fingers twitched where they were resting lightly around Peisistratus’ throat, pressing down just a little every time his cock was all the way down it. He didn’t squeeze down, though. Breathplay was not a thing you surprised someone with, he had enough good sense for that.

Peisistratus gave a little hum as he worked, taking in how it made Antinous’ thighs clench and shake, hips twitching with how much they wanted to buck into Peisistratus’ mouth.

“You like my cock? Does it fit so well down that tight throat?” Antinous teased.

Peisistratus pulled off, to catch his breath for just a second. “…It’s nice,” he shrugged, non-committal. Then he was diving back down, which maybe ruined the nonchalant image he was trying to portray, but whatever.

They were still making eye contact when Antinous visibly decided to risk it and play dirty.

“Telemachus liked my cock too. Liked it a lot. He let me fuck him so good in his tight little cunt.”

Peisistratus, startled, swallowed extra hard around the cock as it bottomed out in his mouth.

“Oh, you want to hear more about that, don’t you? About how I got to pound him into the mattress? About how the dick currently in your mouth was inside him only a few days ago? Almost too bad we had to be responsible and use a condom, cuz wouldn’t that be a head trip. I mean, I’ve obviously showered since then, but would that stop you from searching for a taste of him through the taste of me?”

And Peisistratus couldn’t refute that, only partly because he was choking down that cock like his life depended on it, chin wet with saliva and pre-come. His thighs pressed together tightly, as if he could ignore how hard he was, listening to Antinous talk about his best friend like that. He tried not to imagine it.

He failed.

“I wanted to eat him out so bad, but I wasn’t sure if I’d ever get him a second time, so I had to prioritize. It was the right choice- it meant I got to watch him finger himself on top of me. You really should see him like that, he’s so cute when he’s got something stretching him open. Fuck, do that again, you’ve got a great mouth, Jesus fucking Christ.”

Peisistratus did that again, amping up the suction as he pressed the flat of his tongue down on the vein, bobbing back and forth like a man possessed. His hips twitched forward without his permission, the image of Telemachus touching himself in his head. It was probably ten types of rude to imagine it, but Peisistratus had left propriety by the door when he decided to suck Antinous off in the first place.

“Oh goddammit,” Antinous grumbled, causing Peisistratus to pause, pulling back enough so that he wasn’t choking himself as he looked up. Antinous had been riffling through a small shelf at the head of the bed.

“I don’t have lube in the fucking RV. It’s all back where we’re staying. So, I guess we’re just going to have to be a bit more creative.”

Peisistratus pulled the rest of the way off. “I was sort of assuming I was just gonna blow you and use my hand on myself,” he shrugged, voice absolutely wrecked.

Antinous looked down, incredulous. “What? That’d be lame. I don’t leave people hanging like that, especially not people that are as talented with their tongue as you are. I’d at least get my hand around you, not make you do it yourself. In fact…”

Peisistratus was seized by his shirt collar, pulled up onto the bed so hard he felt one of the buttons on his shirt give way. Antinous slammed their mouths together, and Peisistratus was so shocked he didn’t even think about resisting when Antinous shoved his tongue in, not that he necessarily would have regardless. He reciprocated as best he could, head still reeling from the sudden change in position. Everything tasted like hot chocolate and cigarettes and cock, which was a weird combination but not objectionable. Kind of nice, actually.

Antinous made a grab for Peisistratus’ pants, snapping them open, barely avoiding ripping the closure clean off, and shoved them down over Peisistratus’ hips.

“Wanna see what you’re working with,” Antinous said breathlessly, palming Peisistratus’ crotch firmly before working his hands into the waistband and sliding them down to join the pants around Peisistratus’ knees.

“Oh fuck,” Antinous laughed, delighted, when he got his hands on Peisistratus’ dick. “We’re almost the same size. I’m not sure if I can get my hand around both of us at the same time.”

Oh. That’s where all this was leading. Not that he was in a complaining mood, not with the delightful way Antinous’ palms felt against his sensitive skin.

“One hand each?” Peisistratus suggested. His brain had finally decided he didn’t need shame any more, and had swiftly ejected it. “Almost like we’re holding hands, except X-rated,” he teased.

Antinous groaned, adjusting the both of them so their hips were pressed together, cocks slotted together. Antinous was maybe half an inch bigger, though Peisistratus didn’t really care about that sort of thing. Something something not the size of the boat. He took the initiative to reach between their bodies and grab, hand indeed not closing all the way with both dicks in his fist, frotting against each other. They were slick with what saliva hadn’t already dried, and the pre-come they were both practically dripping, making the slow glide easy as Peisistratus stroked them.

“Your hands run hot,” Antinous informed him, sounding pleased about it. He put his own hand on top of Peisistratus’, pressing their fingers harder, adding more pressure.

Peisistratus was the one to initiate the kiss this time, moaning into Antinous’ mouth as the man guided their hands faster and faster. It was indeed almost like they were holding hands, and Peisistratus decided he was not going to unpack the way that made his stomach twist.

Antinous used his unoccupied hand to pull his own shirt off. “Don’t want to stain it,” he said by way of explanation. “Gravity means it’s my stomach that’s gonna get covered.”

Peisistratus coughed out a laugh, only to immediately devolve into moans, as more noises got wrenched from his throat when Antinous twisted their hands just right.

“Ah! Fuck,” Peisistratus got out. “You do this o-often?”

“Occasionally,” Antinous chuckled. He left it there, though, too caught up in pumping their hands up and down the length of their cocks, brushing his hips up to get even more friction. Sometimes, on the up motion, he’d rub his thumb over the heads, making Peisistratus bite back swears and try to remember how breathing worked.

Antinous kissed up Peisistratus’ jaw, nipping at his earlobe before whispering, “You look so good like this, about to pop. You looked good choking on my dick too, you know. Wanted to fill your mouth up. Thoughts for next time.”

Peisistratus opened his mouth to snap that there wasn’t going to be a next time, jackass, but all that came out was a whimper of a moan as he tried not to bite his own tongue, in the haze of pleasure.

“Menace,” he eventually got out, before he planted his face into the crook of Antinous’ neck.

“You know it, babe,” Antinous joked, when Peisistratus was too compromised to even smack him for it.

Antinous decided not to press his luck further with more smart ass comments and pet names, instead laving sucking, biting kisses onto Peisistratus’ throat, tilting his head up with the hand not rendering them both into puddles of nerve endings.

Somehow, despite everything, Peisistratus came first. It did indeed paint Antinous’ built stomach in white streaks, then more when he inevitably followed right after. By some miracle, none managed to get onto Peisistratus’ shirt, which he probably should have taken off at some point. It hit him that he was actually still mostly clothed, pants tangled around his knees and shirt rucked up to show his stomach. The entire thing had been so frantic, he hadn’t even thought about it.

The two of them laid there, panting into each other’s ears, for a long, languid moment. Until the universe decided to embarrass the fuck out of Peisistratus.

Oh! Well!

Never was there ever,

A cat so clever,

As the Magical Mister Mistoffelees!

“Fuck!” Peisistratus shot out, grabbing for his phone to silence the alarm. He’d completely lost track of time; he was supposed to be getting in his truck to go pick Telemachus up from the eye doctor. If he could even look Tele in the eye after everything that had just happened, fucking hell.

Antinous was laughing at him, grabbing a pack of wipes to clean his stomach off.

“You a big fan of Cats?” he asked.

“I like musicals,” Peisistratus said, defensively.

“I’d have pegged you for someone into more dramatic, plot driven storytelling,” Antinous commented, almost idly, watching as Peisistratus finished yanking his pants back up and getting the button done.

“It’s the dancing. It’s fun to watch,” Peisistratus shrugged, faking nonchalance. “Anyways, I’ve gotta go. See you later, probably. Uh. Thank? You?” he added, hesitantly. He wasn’t sure what the procedure was for when you had to rush out of an ill-advised hookup where you’d came so hard it scrambled your brain for a minute.

Antinous just laughed at him as he hurried out, but didn’t seem offended.

It wasn’t until much later that Peisistratus realized that Antinous had realized immediately what musical the song was from, and that he'd sounded like he had opinions about it. Peisistratus made up his mind to grill him on it later.

Chapter Text

Peisistratus had divulged absolutely nothing, not even after he and Telemachus broke out the stash of Nausicaa’s newest cultivar, and Telemachus was a little disappointed by this. He wasn’t going to explain why this disappointed him, because he was fully aware saying ‘I wanna know so I can jack off about it later’ was an absolutely fucked up thing to say. Peisistratus didn’t seem to be limping though, so there was that.

“No, I don’t still have the button,” Peisistratus sighed, exhaling his latest lungful of smoke. “It’s probably somewhere lost in the blankets of that tiny little bed.”

“Yeah, that’s another thing. All three of those guys are pretty big. How do you think they fit on the RV’s beds without clonking themselves in the head?” Telemachus asked. He took his own pull of the pipe, and handed it back to Peisistratus.

“They probably know how to scrunch,” Peisistratus said thoughtfully. “They also probably do clonk their heads all the time, but just got used to it. I mean, that’s probably why they rent out a place whenever they stay in a town.”

“That and showers,” Telemachus nodded.

“Fuck, yeah. Showers. I couldn’t imagine being like, a foot taller than I am now, and still try to fit in that teensy little RV bathroom. I’d rather clean off in a river or something, and it’s like. Super cold out right now.”

After a long moment of content silence, Peisistratus handed the pipe over again. “I should probably ease off before I can’t think straight anymore.”

“Ugh, I’m too high to come up with a funny joke about neither of us being straight,” Telemachus whined, before taking an extra long drag from the pipe. He set it to the side to let it go out on its own.

“I’ll pretend you said something scathing and hilarious,” Peisistratus nodded. “Also, are you supposed to be smoking on your new meds?” he asked, extremely belatedly.

“The doc didn’t say anything about it. Just warned me not to drink too much, because apparently it makes you have literally no tolerance. I feel like I usually do, though, so it’s probably fine. I’ll probably Google it tomorrow.” This last bit was a concession, added when Telemachus saw the face Peisistratus was making.

Peisistratus nodded, accepting this.

It was two in the morning, and they were both curled up on Telemachus’ bed, Peisistratus actually asleep but Telemachus just looking at him, watching the way his dark auburn hair framed his narrow, beautiful face. High cheek bones and full lips, lots of eyelashes. A couple of hickeys showed above the collar of his pajama shirt, lurid and red.

Telemachus wondered if he should feel jealous about it, jealous that he wasn’t the one to put them there. He decided against it, though. He didn’t have a right to the emotion, not when their relationship was entirely platonic. And not when he’d fucked the guy who was responsible only a few days ago. He had his own set of hickeys that were now mostly faded. Jealousy was boring, anyway. It felt cloying and insecure, and Telemachus had enough insecurities, thank you so very much.

Instead of being jealous, he could just imagine himself in the middle of them both. Which he was going to stop doing right that fucking second, actually, because he was flying too close to the sun. He was already pushing his luck about the creepy thing by watching Peisistratus’ face as he slept, he did not need to be fantasizing while next to him in bed, especially without permission.

He turned over to the other side and shut his eyes, willing sleep to overtake him. Thankfully, he only had to stare at the inside of his eyelids for a few minutes before it did.

Stalkerdouche: Hey, little wolfie. You and boy scout want to camp out with us? We got that reservation for the campsite where Leander encountered the whatever the fuck it was, for tonight and tomorrow night. I meant to ask the boy scout yesterday, but I completely forgot.

It was late morning. Peisistratus had left for work early, but Telemachus was still in the process of waking up, stumbling around the kitchen with his second mug of coffee.

Tele: Five people in a tent sounds like a nightmare, especially if three of them are fucking largehuge.

Stalkerdouche: We’ve got two. Eury and Amphi are probably taking one, so you two can shack up with me ;p

Tele: I’ll think about it. Also, I have to ask, what the actual fuck is up with those nicknames?

Stalkerdouche: You’re tiny and you growled at me the first time we met, and Peisi is the platonic ideal of a boy scout. Cept that mouth of his.

Tele: Hey, he doesn’t swear *that* much.

Stalkerdouche: Not what I was talking about ;p ;p ;p

Tele: ???????!???

Stalkerdouche: Ope. Well, if he didn’t give you the details I’m certainly not going to.

Tele: I’M GOOD AT INFERRING. FUCK RIGHT OFF.

Stalkerdouche: Gotta go, see you tonight maybe.

Tele: COWARD. FACE YOUR CONCEQUENCES.

Antinous did not respond further.

With a sigh, Telemachus took a screenshot of the camping invite and sent it to Peisistratus. Wisely, he didn’t include the part about Antinous bragging about what he and Peisi may or may not have gotten up to. He did not necessarily want to have that conversation over text. That was an in-person conversation.

Once he got off shift today, Peisistratus had the next two off, so he’d be there the whole time, which settled Telemachus’ anxiety about the whole idea.

Tele: Thoughts?

Peisi: And prayers. I wouldn’t be opposed, per se, but I’m bringing Nausicaa’s gun and my hunting knife. I don’t think they’ll do anything, but better safe than sorry. And also wildlife.

Tele: And the like .0001% chance we do run into some sort of Creature.

Peisi: Add a few more zeros to that, monster lover.

Peisi: Also, I’ll drive us in the truck so we can escape if they get too annoying.

Tele: Leave me and my deep unending love for the mothman out of this! And yes, escape plan = good.

He switched his text conversation over to his mom.

Tele: I’m making dumb choices again, please don’t be mad at meeeee!

Mothership: If it requires bail money, then I at least get to relentlessly make fun of you until you’re 25.

Tele: Peisi and me are going camping. We’re going cryptid huntin’

Mothership: Telemachus. My sweet baby boy. Light of my life. It’s the middle of February, and you have no tolerance for the cold.

Tele: They’ve got tent heaters!!

Mothership: Kiddo. Are you going camping with the podcasters?????

Tele: Remember when I said to not get mad at me?

Mothership: Okay. You’re an adult. I love you a whole lot, and I’m going to trust you, but. BUT. You need to send me the location and text me updates at least every hour or two until you go to bed. You remember the safety words we set up when you were little? In case you were in trouble and needed help?

Tele: Yes, mom. I remember. Remember, Peisistratus will be there too.

Mothership: The only reason I’m not trying to talk you out of it. That and you’re just as stubborn as your father is, so I know you’d sneak out anyway.

Tele: Love you too, mumsy

He went back to the convo with Antinous.

Tele: Okay, we’ll join. We’ll meet you there after Peisi gets off work.

Stalkerdouche: Fabulous. Burgers or hotdogs?

Tele: Burgers, lest I never hear the end of the sex jokes you would surely make.

Antinous: ;p

So, Telemachus packed a couple changes of clothes and one of his better coats, as well as sticking the butterfly knife he’d made many a joke about into the backpack he picked out. He didn’t pack up absolutely everything, just in case Peisistratus was mad enough about Antinous’ implications that he didn’t want to go anymore. He did still raid the tote of camping supplies though, to grab a lantern and a powerpack for his phone. It was one of those solar ones.

It was unfortunately too cold for fishing, so Telemachus simply gave his fishing pole a longing look as he put it back in its place on top of the camping tote in the garage.

Another unfortunate thing was that, while Telemachus absolutely adored Devil’s Den, he’d always wanted to go into the caves. But they’d been closed since he was five. White-nose syndrome in bats had forced the park to close the caves off from public access, in hopes of containing the spread. Once upon a time, Telemachus had considered studying to become a bat researcher to help the problem, but unfortunately it turned out that he sucked at college. Maybe he’d go back once his panic disorder was under better control, but as it was, he wasn’t going to waste money on classes he was just going to fail.

Peisistratus arrived, freshly showered and dressed in flannel and jeans, around five that afternoon, ready to go but very quiet. Worryingly quiet.

“What’s wrong? Someone mop the floors with window cleaner again?” Telemachus asked, poking him in the cheek. It got a flash of a wan little smile.

“It’s. It’s complicated,” Peisistratus said, shaking his head. “I just have some internal shit I’m working out, ya know?”

Telemachus frowned at him. “You know I'm always willing to listen, right? You’ve heard my meltdowns countless times, it’s only fair to listen to you bitch a bit.”

There was something in Peisistratus’ eyes that Telemachus didn’t know how to interpret, but his friend just sighed and gave another weak little half-grin.

“Yeah, I know. And I do appreciate it. It’s just one of those things that…” he paused, searching for his words.

“It’s complicated,” he repeated, in the end.

Telemachus could have not brought up the texts, he really could have. It would be probably understandable, not to further upset Peisistratus with whatever was going on in that head of his. But Telemachus didn’t like keeping secrets. Not telling Peisistratus about hooking up with Antinous had eaten at him for the two short days he had kept it quiet.

“I may be about to make your mood worse,” Telemachus said, ripping the Band-Aid off. “I know you didn’t really want to tell me details about the thing that happened yesterday, but…”

“Antinous was much less stingy with those details?” Peisistratus guessed, rubbing his temples.

Telemachus showed him the text conversation. Instead of getting fidgety or further upset, Peisistratus laughed.

“That’s a lot less bragging than I thought he was going to do. It’s not that I was never going to talk about it, I was just processing,” Peisistratus promised. “I mean, we’re only three years out from my rumored high-school promiscuity. You knew my reputation back then. Well, maybe I can’t say it was a rumor if it was mostly true.”

“I do remember your slut era,” Telemachus nodded, endlessly relieved. Communication! It was a lot easier than he thought it was going to be.

“Did they still call me ‘Bj Queer’ after I left, or did they come up with something more inventive?”

“Most of the worst offenders graduated the same year you did,” Telemachus said. “And the rest didn’t feel like passing on tale of your legacy.”

“Lame,” Peisistratus grumbled, not actually meaning it, if the quirk at the side of his mouth was any indication. “Bet the basketball team still remembered me though.”

“Do not remind me,” Telemachus groaned. “You made us go to nearly every game, you lunatic. I made really good friends with the guy who ran the concession stand while you were off doing whatever it was you were doing.”

“I think the nickname makes it self explanatory what I was doing.”

“You know, after you and Andros broke up, I thought we’d stop having to go, but noooo, apparently you had to show him what he was fucking missing,” Telemachus continued, poking Peisistratus in the chest. There was no real heat to his tone. This was an ‘argument’ they had had many times before.

“If he didn’t want me hooking up with his teammates, he shouldn’t have dumped me to pretend to be straight,” Peisistratus shrugged. “I saw him at pride last year, too, so that didn’t even last that long.”

“Wait, you never told me that!” Telemachus laughed. “Did you talk to him?”

“Nah. It would have been too awkward, and he was an asshole anyway, so I just pretended not to notice him.”

“That teaches me to get a migraine on the day of the parade,” Telemachus said.

“Enough reminiscing, let’s get gone before it’s pitch black by the time we get there,” Peisistratus told him, helpfully grabbing Telemachus’ sleeping bag.

“Sure, sure,” Telemachus agreed.

Telemachus quickly grabbed the last of his toiletries, shoving them in his backpack as they made their way to the truck.

It was still pretty dark by the time they got there, and it was only by a combination of luck and looking for the only lit fire that they found the right campsite.

“Welcome!” Antinous cheered as soon as the stepped out of the truck, waving his spatula at them. He was standing over the grill, loaded down with various meats, making sure none of them burned. He wore an apron that had a presumably funny slogan on it, but it was too dark to read it. “Get a plate!”

“So, we’ve got motion sense lights and cameras rigged all around the site,” Amphinomus explained as they sat down with their respective burgers. Eurymachus was in the process of stringing fairy lights all over the camper and tent. “If anyone or anything gets close to camp, we’ll know.”

“Keep your shoes in the tent, in case it snows or rains overnight,” Eurymachus added, coming to sit down, his own plate carrying a hotdog. “Or to keep critters from grabbing them.”

“Raccoons stole his sneakers once, back when we first started,” Amphinomus stage-whispered, earning a glare from the other man.

“And if we do see something spooky?” Telemachus asked with a mouthful of burger.

“Try not to get murdered by it, and try to get it on camera,” Amphinomus said. “And that’s in order of importance. You can’t show people a new discovery if you’re already dead.”

“Well, we could technically spread the truth if you wound up dead,” Eurymachus shrugged. It got him an elbow to the ribs.

“If General Laerson is ever found, I’m not going to be one of the dumbasses who got his son killed, Eury,” Amphinomus informed him, grin a little manic. “Or you, Pei-pei, don’t think we’d let you get eaten just because your dad isn’t as famous.”

“If the general’s not trapped in some secret government facility somewhere,” Eurymachus mumbled, mostly to himself. The rest of the group pretended they didn’t hear him.

“A pre-emptive thanks for not getting me killed,” Peisistratus said, saluting with a can of beer he’d swiped from a cooler that Telemachus hadn’t noticed.

“Oh, thank god someone’s drinking the apple flavor,” Antinous said, finally leaving his station by the grill to come sit down. He was carrying a platter with the rest of the grilled meat in various stages of doneness. “I had one, liked it, bought a giant case, then realized I didn’t like it as much as I thought. Please feel free to drink as many as you want.”

“I like fruity beer,” Peisistratus shrugged.

“I’m trying it too, you can have the rest if I hate it,” Telemachus told Peisistratus, already reaching into the cooler before they could call him on being technically not legal drinking age. They let him grab one.

“You ever tried lambic? It’s Belgian, made with actual fruit instead of whatever they used to flavor these ones,” Antinous said. “I’ve got some Lindemans raspberry if you want to try a sip.”

“I think I’ve seen that at the store, but I’ve never tried it before,” Peisistratus said. “Maybe later, once I’m done with the one I’ve got already.”

Telemachus liked the apple beer more than he did regular beer. Which wasn’t saying much, because he absolutely hated regular beer. This, at least, he could see himself finishing.

The night wore on, with Amphinomus sharing stories of things they’d seen on the road, some spooky experiences that probably had normal explanations, but it was fun to imagine it was really a ghost of creature. Eurymachus shared his most batshit conspiracy theories. Next to Telemachus, Antinous and Peisistratus were having a quiet but heated discussion, each about two Lindemans and however many apple beers in. So, being nosy, Telemachus tuned out of the conspiracy nonsense and into whatever it was they were arguing about.

“No, I’m pretending the Tom Hooper movie doesn’t exist,” Peisistratus was saying. “The 1998 proshoot is the version I like the most. Even if I think the after effects were a little much. All I’m saying is that you’d make a better Macavity.”

“Why can’t I be Tugger?” Antinous asked. “I’ve got the charisma for it. Besides, isn’t Macavity a ginger cat?” As Antinous said this, he reached over to flick Peisistratus’ hair.

“If you really want to claim The Rum Tum Tugger, then at least relegate me to Munkustrap,” Peisistratus argued back. “I don’t have the vibes for Macavity.”

“Are you guys seriously arguing about which cat you’d be from that fucking musical?” Telemachus asked, interrupting whatever Antinous had been about to say.

“Yes,” Peisistratus nodded.

“We’ve decided you’re Mr Mistoffelees,” Antinous added.

“Which ones are me and Amphi?” Eurymachus asked from his spot poking at the fire.

“Amphinomus is Skimbleshanks,” Peisistratus told him.

“Hey, Eury can be Macavity,” Antinous suggested.

“Eh. I think you’re getting too lost in the whole ginger thing. Eurymachus doesn’t have the right vibes either. Maybe he can be Mungojerry.

Amphinomus leaned over to Telemachus, whispering, “You have any idea what the hell those two are on about?”

“Not a clue,” Telemachus whispered back. “Peisistratus loves musicals. Cats is one of his favorites, but I never did get around to watching it all the way through; I get confused as to who all the characters are and what’s going on.”

“It’s very dance focused,” Peisistratus said, gesturing with his bottle. “You have to be good at, like, body language to fully understand what’s going on. Like how Jenny Anydots is crushing on Asparagus, or how Mr Mistoffelees is related to Bustopher Jones.”

“Or that Misto and Tugger are fucking on the side,” Antinous coughed into his beer.

“Right. That too,” Peisistratus agreed.

“I’m going to say this as politely as possible,” Telemachus started, grabbing one of Peisistratus’ hands, “but this all sounds like a fever dream someone made up after too much cocaine.”

“It was the eighties,” Peisistratus conceded. “It’s a hot mess, yeah, but honestly that’s why it’s so fun.”

“I can only hope that people feel the same about me,” Telemachus joked.

This was apparently the wrong thing to say, because Peisistratus snapped his head up to look at him, eyes all big and round and a little teary. “You’re not a hot mess! You are so much fun to be around!”

“I. Um. I won’t argue with you when you’re drunk,” Telemachus said magnanimously.

“No arguing with me on this period,” Peisistratus said, deadly serious except for the fact that he was blinking a little too rapidly. He poked Telemachus in the sternum with an accusing finger.

“Okay, okay, I won’t,” Telemachus promised. “We should probably get you to bed though. I think you might have had one too many.”

Peisistratus blinked a few more times before he nodded, conceding. “Yeah. Probably.”

Telemachus had only had two, sipping slowly, but he was feeling weirdly buzzed as well. Okay, maybe not that weird considering the new medication. Which was the reason he’d been drinking so slowly in the first place.

“I’m probably gonna head to bed too,” Telemachus told the others.

“We can get an early start tomorrow,” Amphinomus nodded.

Telemachus helped Peisistratus into the tent, helped him get off his shoes, and tipped him over onto the air mattress set up in the center. It was a queen size, so maybe a bit of a tight squeeze for three people, but whatever. Two of them at least had the decency to be small.

He left his coat on just in case the tent heater wasn’t as effective as he’d been led to believe, and crawled in beside Peisistratus, bundling them both under thick blankets that smelled like dirt and wood smoke. He sent his mom the last text of the night before he closed his eyes and settled in to sleep.

At some point in the night, Telemachus woke up enough to register four arms wrapped around him- Peisistratus’ around his shoulders, Antinous’ around his waist. It was actually kind of nice, to be surrounded on all sides like that. Like sleeping under a weighted blanket.

He easily settled back down and fell deeper into sleep.

Chapter Text

The day began with fingers finding their way under Telemachus’ shirt, warm hands soothing over his stomach, fidgeting with his naval piercing. He’d taken off his coat at some point during the night- the heater really did work that well- so there wasn’t much obstruction.

“Dude, not while I’m sleeping,” Telemachus grumbled to Antinous, who didn’t respond.

With a glance back, Telemachus noted that Antinous appeared to still be sleeping. Appeared to be. The hands moved to almost knead his sides, like the man was an overgrown cat.

“Are you really asleep?” Telemachus asked, examining his face for any twitch that would indicate he was merely pretending. There didn’t seem to be any, but Telemachus didn’t feel like getting pawed at, so he blew in Antinous’ face to startle him awake.

“Mnyeh?” came the sleepy little noises of Antinous waking up, blinking in the low morning light.

“You were getting handsy,” Telemachus explained.

“Oh, sorry,” Antinous grunted, at least having the decency to look apologetic, and to smooth Telemachus’ shirt down again. “I used to sleepwalk. Didn’t realize I was gonna sleep grope.”

“Need me to take middle spot tonight?” Peisistratus asked, face still buried in the pillow. It made both Telemachus and Antinous startle. Neither had realized he was awake.

“Nah, we’ll just tie his hands behind his back,” Telemachus joked.

“Kinky,” Antinous said with an approving nod.

Nobody dignified that with a response.

“How’s your head?” Telemachus asked. “You might have gone a little overboard last night,” he teased, pressing one cold foot up against Peisistratus’ side.

“Only mildly nauseated. I was drinking water too, so it’s not as bad as it could be. Aside from the fact I had to sneak out of the tent and pee like a dozen times last night,” Peisistratus groaned, scratching at his scalp. His ponytail tie had gotten lost at some point during the night, so his hair was a bit of a tangled mess.

“Well, the fix for that is some greasy bacon and Dutch oven biscuits,” Antinous said, shoving off the blankets and grabbing his coat and shoes. “We also have orange juice if you want.”

Amphinomus and Eurymachus were already up by the time they all shuffled out of the tent, boiling water over the fire to pour into the comically large coffee percolator. Antinous set to work making breakfast, pulling out a various assortment of cast iron skillets and pots lovingly packed into the RV’s outer storage. The three podcasters fell in easy synchrony around each other.

Feeling rather superfluous, Telemachus and Peisistratus silently but mutually agreed to take up cleaning duty, gathering wrappers and empty cans, wiping down the table, and dusting the fine layer of snow away from the seats. It most likely just added to the mental tally of ‘Peisistratus (and now Telemachus too) is a boy scout’ in Antinous’ head, but it was whatever.

By the time they were finished, the coffee was ready, so they settled down for a cup each while Antinous merrily gave the run down of how he’d planned that day’s cryptid hunting activities. The biscuits needed a little longer to finish cooking, so they munched on bacon and eggs while they waited.

“There should always be a person or two here at camp in case something goes wrong,” Antinous was saying, chewing methodically. “If we need to call in emergency services, camp is more likely to have cell service. If we need someone to drive and pick one of the away team back up, it’ll be much faster than having someone trek their ass here to come get the car.

“Now, we have three walkie-talkies charged up and ready to go. They’ve got about twenty miles of range, but we shouldn’t need nearly that much. Two will be with the away team, in case we need to split up, and one will be here with the campsite team, in case something happens and we need to radio them. We’ve also got three GPS devices that, today, will all be with the away team. In case of separation, we can all be individually tracked down.

“Within a half mile of camp, if someone needs to head back on their own, that’s okay as long as they bring one of the walkie-talkies, but any further than that and we all move as a group.”

“The buddy system,” Telemachus agreed.

“Precisely! The plan is to hit the shorter trailhead before lunch, then before dinner we get the longer one that we didn’t hike last time. I’ve mapped it out, if you want to take a look,” Antinous added, slapping a big laminated map onto the table. In magic marker, he’d drawn the path they were planning to take in big, bold red.

Eurymachus pulled the biscuits out of the fire, setting the Dutch oven down on a spare oven mitt. They had butter, honey, and three types of fruit preserves to spread on them once they cooled down enough to grab from the cast iron.

Telemachus grabbed two, one for smothering in butter and honey, the other for spreading pear preserves on.

He looked at the jar of preserves, and the handwritten label on it. “One of you make these?” he asked the three podcasters. “They’re really good.”

“My grandma Lil did,” Eurymachus said, almost a little shy. “She owns a few acres of pear orchard up in Washington. She ships a few jars to me every fall.”

“Oh, my mom’s got family up there,” Peisistratus said, perking his head op from where he’d been hunched over his- third- mug of coffee. “Didn’t realize they had pear orchards there.”

“One of the biggest locations for pears in the country,” Eurymachus said with a smug little grin.

“We need to figure out who’s going and who’s staying,” Antinous interrupted, heading off whatever Eurymachus had been about to start.

“I’ll stay,” Amphinomus volunteered. “I’ve got some editing I should get done, I need content up on my Patreon before they riot over there. They’ve been waiting forever for a new video, I should probably give them something.”

“You staying or going, Eury?” Antinous asked. “I assume you two will want to come,” he added, gesturing at Telemachus and Peisistratus.

“I’ll go,” Eurymachus said.

“We definitely want to go,” said Telemachus, nodding intently. Peisistratus gave a thumbs up, finishing the last of his coffee as he visibly sighed in relief. The caffeine must have just hit.

The trailhead was a five minute walk from the campsite, and five more minutes down the trail was a waterfall and a tiny little stream that it fed. Beside the waterfall, there was a hidden little alcove that Telemachus noticed as they were about to pass. It wasn’t quite big enough to actually be called a cave, so it hadn’t been blocked off.

“You think anything interesting could fit in there?” he asked, shining his phone’s flashlight into the alcove.

“Maybe a person or two, if they scrunched up really tiny,” Eurymachus shrugged.

“Here, can you hold the light and keep it pointed in? I want to poke around for just a minute,” Telemachus said, handing Eurymachus the phone. Eurymachus took it easily enough.

“Please be careful,” Peisistratus fretted.

“I will,” Telemachus told him, and he was! He was being very careful, taking great pains to find a good, solid place to put his foot next, and to grab the outcropping of rock to keep his balance.

Which is why it was utterly unfair when the thought-to-be-steady ground under his feet shifted, and he fell into the stream.

Eurymachus was closest to him, so managed to get there first to help haul him out, shivering and covered in mud.

“Shit, shit, fuck, shit,” Telemachus swore. “I’m so sorry,” he apologized to Eurymachus, whose shirt was now also wet and muddy. The coat he was wearing was unzipped, so while that had saved most of it, the front of the shirt had still gotten pretty soaked.

“Are you okay? Are you hurt?” Peisistratus asked, rushing in to look him over, hands hovering as if he was afraid to touch.

“I’m fine, just drenched,” Telemachus complained. “Don’t suppose the sun’s strong enough to dry me out today, you think?”

“Nope, you need to go shower and change before your ass gets hypothermia,” Antinous said, more serious than Telemachus had ever heard him before. “I would bet not a single thing on you is wool.”

“My coat lining is,” Telemachus squawked defensively. “And I’m wearing winter leggings!”

“That’ll buy you time to get back to camp and change, but that shirt you put on this morning looked awfully like cotton,” Antinous pressed.

“I’ll walk him back,” Eurymachus offered. “I need to change too. I’ll come back out once I’m sure he’s not gonna lose any toes.”

“I’m not going to lose toes walking the ten whole minutes back to camp,” Telemachus scoffed. “I may not be used to blizzards and negative forty like you two, but I’m not a newborn kitten.”

“You should still get cleaned up and warmed up,” Peisistratus said, not unkindly.

“We’ve got a little washer and dryer in the RV,” Antinous added. “That coat needs a good spin cycle before it’ll do shit for the cold.”

“Alright, fine, fine, I’m going,” Telemachus said, trying not to let them know how hard his teeth wanted to chatter and shiver in that moment. Instead, he just let Eurymachus steer him back towards the trailhead, and back towards camp.

“Thank you,” he added when Eurymachus handed him his phone back. At least that hadn’t gotten covered in freezing water and mud.

“So,” Antinous started, leaning up next to the half-frozen waterfall. “We’re stuck waiting here until Eury gets back,” he noted.

“Yeah?” Peisistratus asked, giving a non-committal little shrug.

Then he was being hoisted up to sit on a flat stretch of rock that left his legs dangling a couple of feet off the ground, and Antinous’ face at the same height as Peisistratus’ chest.

“Hey!” he said indignantly.

“I thought, if we have time to waste,” Antinous said, sliding Peisistratus’ legs open and slipping between them, “maybe I return the favor you did for me? Have a little fun?”

He rested his hand on Peisistratus’ crotch, inching one finger up to play with the zipper.

“I’ll admit, it’s been a while since I blew someone with a dick, especially one like yours, so I may need a minute or two to remember how to get it all in,” he added, teasing, leaning down to rest his chin on Peisistratus’ lap.

“We…we’re in public!” Peisistratus protested, though it was token at best and they both knew it.

“We’re the only ones here,” was Antinous’ reply to that.

“I- I. I’m, um. Not sure…” Peisistratus stumbled over his words, trying to make up his mind if he wanted this or not.

He almost expected Antinous to get impatient and yank his pants down, but Antinous stayed there, head in Peisistratus’ lap, waiting for the final decision. His first serious boyfriend would have gotten pissed already, and either just started regardless, or stormed off.

Peisistratus found that his hand had traveled up to Antinous’ face, thumb rubbing his cheek and tucking a loose loc behind his ear, without any real input from his brain.

Antinous was so pretty like that, all open, waiting expression, one dark brown eye, the glass one a neon green for the day. Maybe it would be okay to do this, to let Antinous play a bit with his body. He was being so patient about it, and Peisistratus couldn’t say he wasn’t interested- it had been forever since someone had their mouth on him. He was usually the one with a dick down his throat. So maybe upgrade that to very interested.

“…Okay,” he decided, giving a short little nod.

“Yeah?” Antinous asked.

“Yeah!” Peisistratus said, more enthusiastic this time.

Antinous’ entire face lit up as he grinned, hands going to undo Peisistratus’ pants and fish him out of his briefs. He wasn’t hard yet, but his dick remembered the hand around it and was making remarkable headway in that direction.

“I didn’t get a proper look at you last time,” Antinous was saying, running his thumb along the slit of the head, watching as it twitched in his grip. “Fuck,” he added, eloquently.

When he finally did take the head into his mouth, it sent Peisistratus scrabbling at the rock, making sure he wasn’t going to twist himself right off the stone outcropping, because holy hell, it was much different than a hand. Peisistratus had worried about getting cold, but between Antinous’ hand and mouth, there was barely any space for his cock to get exposed to the chill air.

Despite saying he was put of practice, Antinous took to sucking dick like a duck to water. He didn’t try to take it all down, getting about halfway before it started to trigger his gag reflex, but he was good at working what he did get into his mouth, with a talented tongue and lips. He kept eye contact like Peisistratus did the last time, even if Peisistratus found his own eyes shuttering shut.

Noises carry pretty far in the wilderness, so Peisistratus shoved his wrist into his own mouth to keep as quiet as possible, even if that meant that the only non-nature noises were from Antinous sucking, occasionally giving a quiet groan of his own and sending vibrations that Peisistratus felt throughout his entire body. He’d probably bruised the hell out of his wrist, but he couldn’t fathom taking it out, because he would probably scream, and he did not want to get caught by a park ranger while his dick was out and in someone else’s mouth.

Antinous twisted his hand at the same time as he sucked a bit harder, and Peisistratus almost screamed anyway. His feet smacked up against the rock just to do something with the frantic energy running through him, since he couldn’t move his hips too much or he’d risk falling right off of his perch.

With a ‘pop’ that sounded much too loud in the quiet forest, Antinous pulled back for a moment.

“You are incredibly sensitive,” he noted, hand not stopping its work of slowly pumping up and down the length of Peisistratus’ cock. With a glint of mischief in his eye, he leaned forward to say, so quietly Peisistratus almost missed it, “Telemachus was this sensitive too. I bet if you used your talented tongue on him, you’d have him screaming your fucking name like a prayer.”

“Not. Fair,” Peisistratus panted past his gnawed-on wrist.

“Oh, I think it’s entirely fair,” Antinous chuckled. “I think you're too far stuck into your own head. Look how much your pretty cock has leaked just at the suggestion that you eat that boy out.”

Peisistratus did look, and immediately regretted it, because Antinous was- tragically, unfortunately, inevitably- right.

Antinous went back down, redoubling his efforts, swallowing down as much as he feasibly could, reaching his other hand down into Peisistratus’ briefs to play with his sac, just a light bit of kneading that added onto everything already happening. Peisistratus fell back, pressing his cheek against cold stone as he writhed, legs kicking out and eventually deciding to just wrap around Antinous’ shoulders. If he fell, Antinous could either catch him or they could follow Telemachus’ example and tumble directly into the stream.

When Peisistratus came, he felt his canine teeth finally break the skin of his wrist, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care even a little bit. Not with the hypersensitive shockwaves that followed Antinous’ tongue as he used it to clean up.

“You have a much healthier diet than I do,” was the comment Antinous made once he’d stuck Peisistratus’ dick back in his underwear and zipped his pants back up.

“You are so fucking weird,” Peisistratus laughed, jelly-legged but still somehow remaining upright when Antinous helped him jump down off the rock. “You want me to help you out?” he asked, with a deliberate look down.

Antinous grinned like he had a secret. “Nah, I’m good. I’ll just let it calm down on its own. Keeps me sharp on hunts like this.”

“I reiterate: fucking weird.”

They were barely done fixing their clothes and hair back to normal when they finally heard Eurymachus trudging his way through the trail back to them.

Telemachus was not pouting, thank you very much. He’d taken a shower in the RV’s tiny bathroom, thankfully with a full tank of hot water, and was waiting for his clothes to finish drying in the also tiny little dryer. While waiting, he’d crawled back into the tent to bury himself under blankets, and aimed the tent heater’s output directly at himself. He was right that the short walk it took to get out of his wet clothes wasn’t long enough to really risk hypothermia, but he was still chilled to the bone.

He felt incredibly annoyed that he’d almost immediately fucked up and got sent back to camp with his metaphorical tail between his legs, but he wasn’t pouting about it, dammit. He just felt a little left out and frustrated, was all.

Telemachus must have dozed off at some point, because the next he was aware, the tent was being unzipped and a large figure slipped in, landing next to him on the air mattress.

“Hey,” Antinous said, propping his head up on one hand to look at Telemachus. “Your coat needed a second go in the dryer, but it’ll be ready for the after-lunch trail, if you want to try again.”

“I’ll stay away from any bodies of water this time,” Telemachus said. He was aiming for a joke, but the edge of his voice was a little too sharp for it to land properly.

“Wasn’t your fault,” Antinous shrugged. “Accidents happen. You were trying not to fall, I saw.”

“I just. I thought it was cool, and I never got to actually go into any of the caves they have here before they were closed to the public, and it wasn’t really a cave, but it was close, and really, how long does it take for someone to figure out a treatment for bat fungus!”

Antinous looked mildly baffled, so Telemachus explained.

“They closed the caves fifteen years ago. They’re still claiming it’s only temporary, but I’ve lived here my whole life and never gone in. I understand why they had to do it, really, save the bats, but it’s hard being rational when I’ve heard so many stories about the caves, you know? Like, a couple of the people I’ve met at the local anime convention have told me about how they visited the caves before they were closed, and how they had so much fun, and they’re sad and worry they’ll never get to experience it again. Meanwhile I’m in the corner thinking, well, I never got to experience it in the first place.”

Really, that was just a recurring theme in his life: feeling left out and left behind. Just because he was young, or the world sucked, or his dad was this super important guy everyone assumed the government killed off for whatever reason.

“It’s not the same, I realize this, but you ever feel like hitching a ride with us, we can go see the caves in Missouri,” Antinous offered. “They’ve got a few different tours and stuff.”

“I knew you were gonna try and kidnap me,” Telemachus joked, wiping his eyes with the heel of his hands. He was tired of being upset, so he was officially hard-rebooting this conversation to something less fucking sad.

“If I was really trying to kidnap you, I’d offer season passes to one of the theme parks over there,” Antinous quipped back, letting him.

“Make it White Water and you might have a deal. But only if you also buy me as many funnel cakes as I want.”

“Not Silver Dollar City? I thought you’d want to ride the roller coasters.”

“Yeah, but swimming is way more fun,” Telemachus insisted. “You feel more like you actually did something, and the slides don’t usually have hour-long lines you have to wait in.”

“And hot guys in swimsuits,” Antinous brought up.

“Hot guys in swimsuits,” Telemachus agreed. “Speaking of. Where’s Peisistratus? Usually he’d be mother-henning me right about now.”

“He looked in on you earlier,” Antinous said. “He’s just way more quiet than I am, so I guess you didn’t wake up. He and Amphi are making a run for more firewood right now. How are you feeling, by the way? Physically, I mean. I know emotionally is a little wonky.”

“Still a bit cold, but just normal cold, not about-to-die cold.”

And it probably wasn’t the most thought-out of ideas, but Telemachus then added, in a low, quiet voice, “You could help me warm up, if you wanted.”

Antinous perked up. “Yeah? You sure?”

Telemachus swallowed, doing a quick evaluation of himself to determine if yeah, he was sure. He’d been kind of low-grade horny that morning due to those wandering hands, thoroughly killed by his accidental mud bath, but proximity and heightened emotions had started to resurrect it. He couldn’t deny that Antinous was hot, and the time they’d had sex before had been a lot of fun- emotional breakdown notwithstanding.

“I’m sure. I mean, you do run pretty warm, s’far as I recall,” Telemachus said with a twitch of a grin.

Antinous snorted a laugh. “If that’s your way of calling me hot, I’ll accept it,” he teased, pulling back the edge of the blankets to crawl under. He adjusted them so that Telemachus’ back was pressed against his chest, hands wrapped snugly around those slender hips. With a sigh, Telemachus relaxed into the hold.

“I’d call you hot more often if I didn’t know it would cause your ego to start having its own gravitational pull,” Telemachus grumbled, because he saw the sniping opportunity and had to take it.

Antinous didn’t seem offended, just snickered into the top of Telemachus’ head as his fingers worked their way into the waistband of Telemachus’ pajama pants.

“Oh, hey, before we get too far. Condoms?” Telemachus asked.

With a flourish, Antinous rolled to the side and pulled open a small zippered pouch on the side of the tent. In it was a few condoms, and a travel-sized lube bottle.

“You ever considered going on birth control?” Antinous asked idly, grabbing one of the condoms and the lube out, before rolling back to tuck himself against Telemachus once more. “Just curious. Not trying to wiggle my way out of wearing this,” he added, gesturing with the condom as he set it on the pillow next to his head.

“Turns out I have a progesterone sensitivity,” Telemachus shrugged. “I took the pill for a year or so in school, and went fucking crazy. Like, ‘the stray cats are secret government robots’ level of paranoia. I could get one of the copper IUDs, but I don’t really feel like having something shoved into my cervix.”

“That’s fair,” Antinous winced. “Wouldn’t want a piece of metal stuck in my nether regions either.”

“So I take it you’re not a fan of sounding, then?”

“Ugh! No!” Antinous cringed. “My dick is crying now, it’s sad you even said that.”

“Oh, well, let me apologize to it,” Telemachus said. He reached back to press his hand over the front of Antinous’ pants, patting it gently. “I’m sorry.”

“I think it forgives you.”

They both lost it in immature giggles, Antinous burying his face into Telemachus’ neck. One of his hands went back to fitting itself down Telemachus’ pajama pants, settling over the underwear to simply rest there, between his legs.

“Good, because certain parts of me want to be its friend,” Telemachus murmured out, face immediately turning a bright red at the light contact alone.

Antinous pressed down more firmly at the same time as he shifted his hips forward, bracketing Telemachus on both sides.

“Oh, it wants to be more than friends with this part right here,” Antinous said, rubbing with his middle finger over the cloth-covered slit. “I’ve been thinking about it often, you know,” he added, more seriously.

He finally slid the hand underneath the boxers, rubbing carefully, softly, as Telemachus took in a sharp breath. He pet around Telemachus’ dick, but didn’t focus his attention there quite yet.

“You were so tight around me, I was worried for a minute that I wasn’t doing it right, that you weren’t prepped enough. But then I looked at your face, and you looked all blessed out,” Antinous whispered.

“I,” Telemachus started, having to pause to swallow and try again. “I was pretty sore for like two days,” he said, breathing out a little laugh. “I don’t regret it though.”

Antinous let out a contemplative hum, rubbing his slightly-stubbly chin against Telemachus’ neck.

“Maybe fucking you like that might not be the best idea, then. Not if you want to actually be able to focus on our hike. I have a solution, if you’d be amenable,” Antinous said, breath hot against Telemachus’ ear.

He whispered his suggestion, and Telemachus felt his thighs squeeze together as he turned his head into the pillow to muffle his moan. He gave Antinous a thumbs-up.

The pants and boxers were yanked down to his knees, still thankfully warm under the thick blankets as Antinous found his way by touch alone, feeling up Telemachus’ inner thighs before traveling back up, rubbing thoughtfully over the folds and up to his dick. Antinous pulled his hand away for just a second, only to put it back, this time with a light dollop of lube on his fingers, focusing on the entrance to get it nice and covered.

Telemachus relaxed again into it, feeling the heat that radiated off the furnace of Antinous’ body as it sank into him along with the fingers.

He nearly whined when they left him, feeling unnaturally empty, though he didn’t have too much time to miss them when they came back with more lube, this time to spread on the innermost part of his thighs.

Antinous pulled his hips back only as far as absolutely necessary to get his pants undone and slide the condom on, before he was pressing right back up against Telemachus, kissing up the smaller man’s neck with a slow, building fervor.

He pressed his cock between Telemachus’ thighs, the head of it nudging up against Telemachus’ own dick, breathing out a quiet swear when their bodies were fully flush. He started up an achingly slow rhythm, using one hand to angle it so each thrust forward slid along the entirety of Telemachus’ cunt.

Telemachus pressed his face down into the pillow again, gasping into the soft cloth as Antinous got two fingers back inside him, seemingly trying to memorize every nerve ending available, and very talented at doing so.

“You’re so soft,” Antinous crooned. “I think these thighs are meant for this, to squeeze so tight around me. Fuck, there’s so much I wanna do with you if you’d let me.”

And Telemachus wanted to let him, right in that moment. Wanted whatever ideas were twisting around in Antinous’ head, wanted to fucking roll over and let Antinous just do as he pleased. He reached down to wrap a hand around Antinous’ cock where it came through his thighs, playing with the head, angling it up against his own dick as Antinous had been doing.

It urged Antinous to thrust faster, both cock and fingers, wringing soft desperate noises from Telemachus.

Antinous continued to whisper delightful, filthy ideas into Telemachus’ ear, but Telemachus was beyond comprehending them at that point, lost in skilled fingers, lost in the heat of Antinous’ body, lost in the slick noise of Antinous fucking his thighs like they were his cunt.

When finally they came, Telemachus letting out a choked cry as he almost lost his grip, there was no part of him that was any sort of cold. All he felt was warm, bubbly buzzing throughout his whole body.

“Gonna miss you when I leave town,” Antinous muttered, so quietly that Telemachus was pretty sure he wasn’t actually supposed to hear it.

“H-how much longer are you staying?” Telemachus asked anyway, through gasps of breath. Antinous froze.

Antinous swallowed, hard, pulling their bodies close again, this time more out of seeking comfort than seeking pleasure.

“…Probably about a week,” he said into the top of Telemachus’ head. “This is actually the longest we’ve stayed in one place. Usually we stay for a week or so, then get out of town, but I negotiated for us to stay for three. There’s a lot of spooky stories in town, you know? And. Um. I know you don’t want to hear about our theories about your father, but we do have them, and they’re a factor as well.”

It wasn’t the whole truth, but Antinous sounded so strangely vulnerable in that moment that Telemachus didn’t feel like calling him on it. Instead, he just pressed his head back, like he was an oversized cat rubbing against someone to ask for headpats. Which Antinous provided, scratching at Telemachus scalp for a few minutes before they pulled apart enough to clean up.

“For what it’s worth,” Telemachus said, once they were set back to rights, getting ready to leave the tent as Peisistratus’ truck pulled back into the campsite, “I’m gonna miss you too.”

Lunch was sandwiches and cucumber salads, once Telemachus retrieved his warm clothes and coat from the RV.

Peisistratus practically pulled Telemachus into his lap, prodding him with concerned questions and checking him for bruising. He did find the small hickey that Antinous had left on his neck, but Telemachus waved off that line of questioning in such an obvious way that Peisistratus probably realized what had transpired.

Antinous wiggled his eyebrows at this display, so Telemachus sneakily flipped him off.

The hike ended up being about two or so hours long, and it was starting to get dark by the time they made it back to camp. It was enough for Telemachus to be grateful for Antinous’ foresight. He probably would have started bitching half an hour in if he’d been sore in a sex way, not just sore in a ‘fell into a stream this morning’ way. As it was, he kept his complaining to a bare minimum, and only after Amphinomus had also started grumbling about how fucking hilly it was on the trail.

They broke out the s’mores once it was fully dark, piling the fire high with the wood Peisistratus and Amphinomus had gone to buy for that express purpose. It almost left them ruined for dinner, but they still managed to put away an alarming amount of chili, cooked in the largest of the cast iron pots.

While neither Peisistratus or Telemachus drank any beer that night, Peisistratus and Antinous managed to get into another argument about musicals, which only ended because Eurymachus got tired of it and threw a spoon at Antinous’ head. He dodged it without looking, so Telemachus assumed they did that often.

When they did finally drift back into their tent for the night, Peisistratus kept his word by being the center of the snuggle sandwich this time. Which Telemachus wasn’t complaining about, because it gave him an excuse to plant his face into Peisistratus’ chest and hold onto him nice and tightly. Just for warmth, of course. No other reason.

All in all, not so bad of a day. Even if they hadn’t seen anything spooky on either hike.

Telemachus didn’t know that it was three in the morning when he woke, his throat burning with thirst, a strange buzzing into his ears, but he could guess that it was still way too early to actually be awake. Everything was pitch black, and while the heater kept the tent nice and cozy, something made Telemachus shiver.

There was a jingling sound coming from outside the tent. A dog collar, maybe? Why would a dog be out here, though, in the middle of February?

The dog scratched at the side of the tent, and Telemachus felt bad for it. It was probably freezing cold, and they were all warm there in the tent. Should he let it in? Maybe they had some leftover ground beef to give it, as a little snack, and they could drive it to the animal shelter once it opened.

Except, it was the oddest thing, but Telemachus couldn’t move. It was like his limbs had been all tied up together. What a time for sleep paralysis. Who knew, maybe the dog was just a hallucination. Maybe he was still dreaming. But…he couldn’t be dreaming, because his throat was screaming at him that he needed a drink.

Telemachus tried to move his tongue at least, because in his limited sleep paralysis experience, even just a little movement could wake him the rest of the way up and he could grab one of the spare water bottles he had in his bag. Was his bag still in the tent? Oh, fuck, he’d left it outside. He really didn’t want to have to go trudging through the cold just for a drink of water.

“Hey, guys, any chance one of you could go outside and grab some water?” Telemachus’ voice asked, even though it seemed like Antinous and Peisistratus were both still soundly asleep.

Despite the warmth of the tent, ice drove itself into Telemachus’ stomach, and he shuddered again, wishing he could move enough to grab at Peisistratus, to make sure he didn’t get up to listen, to leave the tent.

Because Telemachus, frozen in place as he was, hadn’t said a God Damned word.

Chapter Text

Telemachus felt more than saw as Peisistratus shot out a hand and grabbed his wrist, eyes open only a hair. They stared at each other for a long moment, before Peisistratus’ voice responded.

“I could use some water too. Antinous?”

The voice did not come from Peisistratus, but from outside the tent, where the whatever the fuck was still slowly scratching at the side. Where that strange bell sound continued to ring.

They continued to stare at each other, Telemachus unable to move, Peisistratus gripping onto his hand like it was the only thing keeping him stable.

Antinous sat up, in jerky, misfired movements, like he was fighting against his own body. Eyes wide, he looked over to the other two, then his eyes flicked to the wall of the tent, to where the noises were coming from. He slowly laid back down, inching close to Peisistratus to breathe into his ear, “Where’s your gun?”

The scratching stopped, and after a silent moment, whatever was outside turned and started running. The jingling bell noise grew further away in record time.

The paralysis dropped from Telemachus as Antinous exploded into motion, Peisistratus right behind him as they practically tore their way out of the tent, hunting knife in Antinous’ hand, Nausicaa’s gun in Peisistratus’.

Telemachus was busy coughing and wheezing, trying to sit up, and his attempts to get them to maybe not run after a potentially dangerous creature went unheeded. He dragged himself off of the air mattress, grabbing his coat and sliding his shoes on as fast as he could to tumble out after them, because if those morons got themselves murdered he wasn’t explaining how he stayed behind and let it happen.

They were checking the perimeter of the campsite by the time he got out, but there was no sign of whatever had just happened.

“You two better not have been playing a fucking prank on me,” Antinous snarled, kicking at the tent Eurymachus and Amphinomus were sharing. After a moment it unzipped, and the two blearily poked their heads out.

“Whazzafuck?” Amphinomus said, rubbing his eyes.

“Did you not hear what just fucking happened?!” Antinous asked, desperate.

“What just happened?” Eurymachus asked.

Antinous swallowed several times, backing up a few steps. “It was just like. It was just like the first time, except it shouldn’t be, we’re too far south, that’s why I was even investigating it instead of hightailing it out of town the second I heard voice stealer! We. We gotta check the tapes.”

He turned on his heels and headed, dazed, towards where they’d set up trailcams in the trees around the campsite.

Peisistratus finished his perimeter check, and came back to stand beside Telemachus, grabbing his wrist again.

“You’re staying by my side,” he informed Telemachus.

Telemachus had the wherewithal to nod, and absolutely nothing else.

“Are you fucking kidding me?!” Antinous shouted. He was holding two of the cameras, looking back and forth at them with a panicked rage as he slammed them down onto the picnic table. “Dead. Both of them. I know we fucking charged them up before we put them out, the batteries are supposed to last for days!”

Antinous stalked back to the trees, grabbing the other two cameras, only to discover the exact same thing. They’d died at two thirty five, and captured nothing after that. When he threw the final camera down onto the table, he did it with enough force that he cracked the case.

“Anti, you’re freaking out the newbies,” Amphinomus said, nodding to where Telemachus and Peisistratus had remained, standing stock still, as close to the extinguished fire pit as possible.

“They’re freaked out because a fucking wen-” Antinous made himself stop, slapping a trembling hand over his own mouth. “No, it can’t be that. We are too far south, too far south,” he repeated in a self-soothing mantra.

“How about we go into the RV, so we’re a little better protected from the elements?” Amphinomus suggested cautiously.

“Okay,” Antinous said, voice soft and dry, like the few leaves that stubbornly remained on the trees.

They piled in, and Amphinomus made them all hot chocolate, to which Eurymachus promptly added a healthy pouring of some amber liquor from an unlabeled jar. It added a nice cinnamon burn to the smoothness of the chocolate, and helped settle Telemachus’ nerves.

“Antinous. I think you should tell them,” Amphinomus said after they had explained what happened, reaching out to lay one hand on Antinous’ wrist. His tone was still cautious, as if afraid to speak too loud.

Antinous stared into his mug for several seconds, before he finally sighed. “Okay,” he agreed eventually. “I’ll explain.”

His hand went up to press over his glass eye, the other tapping at the table, looking for where he wanted to start.

*

Antinous was eight when it happened.

He was something of a latch-key kid, him and his two sisters. At least, they were when their mom had custody. Their tiny town hadn’t had enough kids to support a good after-school program, so they would get on the bus, then get off at an empty house to wait for the end of their mom’s shift at the hospital two towns over.

One sister was fifteen, so it was agreed that she was old enough to keep an eye on her younger siblings during that time. Well, the agreement was between his sister and their mother; their dad had no idea their mom’s shift ended as late as it did, and they weren’t supposed to tell him.

The house was situated on five acres of property, sitting at the mouth of the forest that Antinous had spent every spring and summer playing in since he could walk. He would often sneak out of the house and go in, just to do his homework under the canopy of trees instead of the oppressive silence of the dinner table.

It was late one night, either December or early January, and the heating system was struggling to keep the drafty house warm, what with the snowstorm raging outside. Antinous was shivering under three blankets in his room.

He was only still awake because school had sucked that day. He’d gotten into another fight, and the teacher had given him a note that his mom had to sign or he’d get in-school suspension. Again. He’d heard the teacher and the vice-principle debating if he needed to be for-real suspended or not. He thought that was unfair; the other boy had started it by calling him words he wasn’t going to repeat, so had needed Antinous to feed him his own teeth. He was stuck ruminating on how extremely annoying the whole situation was.

“Tinny,” he heard, coming from outside. His mom’s voice. “Little Tinny, I need your help. Can you come out here for me?”

It was her old nickname for him, one of many. Tinny, Antimony, Tin-Tin. She liked nicknames, back then.

“We're running low on firewood,” she called. “I know it’s probably pretty chilly in there. Help me haul some in.”

“Kay!” he called back, sliding out of bed and going for his snow boots and coat.

His sisters were both still pretty heavily asleep, but he didn't think about possibly waking them as he unlocked the door and headed out into the snow. After all, his mom hadn’t asked them to come help with the firewood, only him. He allowed himself a little smugness at that.

He pulled the hood over his face as he trudged towards the woodpile, but his mom wasn’t there.

“Ma?” he called, looking around. He wasn’t exactly worried, not yet, but there was something  at the back of his throat that threatened to turn into that worry.

“Tin-Tin! Over here!” her voice came, calling over the howling wind. It had come from the treeline.

“Coming!” he yelled, trudging through the snow as he headed that way. Why she’d move when she was supposed to be waiting for him, Antinous had no idea, but his mom was always a little weird and flighty, so maybe it was just her being herself. Thankfully neither of his sisters were like that; they were both very serious, very cautious.

Except she wasn’t at the start of the trees, and when her voice came again, she was even further away, further back into the forest. Why did she keep moving? Why couldn’t she just stay in place long enough for him to catch up? Why couldn’t he see her? Sure, it was dark, but the snow reflected the moonlight enough that normally he’d be able to see pretty well.

He pulled the coat tighter around himself, wishing he’d thought to put on his extra warm sweater. He’d worn it to school, so there was maybe a little blood on it, but it would still have kept out a little more of the seeking, desperate cold.

There were footprints that he followed, though in retrospect he would admit that they hadn’t been his mother’s size. They were much, much bigger, with strange soles that hadn’t looked like any kind of boots Antinous had ever seen. They were definitely human-shaped, but the bottoms weren’t ridged or patterned, just smooth and featureless.

Finally, he found the little clearing where he liked to do his homework. At least, when it wasn’t covered in almost a foot of snow.

The figure standing at the opposite side was not his mother. They were way too tall, and their coat was made of patchwork leathers, with a furred hood. His mom’s coat was a bright red shiny thing with black, faux-fur trim.

And then the figure was in front of him, all seven feet of height, grayed skin, elongated limbs ending in fingers that were more like sharpened claws. He hadn’t seen them moving.

“Little Tinny,” they said in a parody of his mother’s voice, black eyes glinting down from a gaunt, sunken face. Like the skin had been pulled over bones that were much too big for it.

Antinous took a step back as the monster raised one clawed hand and reached towards him. Instead of grabbing his throat like they had been aiming for, one claw sank into the soft tissue of his eye.

The scream that escaped his throat echoed through the empty night.

Later, he would learn that he’d screamed so loud that his throat bled. That neighbors from miles away called the police when they heard him. That his oldest sister ran to find him without her coat or her boots.

But in that moment, all he felt was fear, and the stabbing, rending pain from his now-unseeing eye.

He didn’t know why the monster didn’t finish him off, alone and so small there in those woods. He just knew that he fell, and that everything went black, and that he was sure he was never going to wake up again.

Then he did. He woke up. In the very same hospital where his mom worked, with a very nice doctor who informed him that, unfortunately, the eye was unrecoverable, and that he’d need to be fitted with a prosthetic to keep his eye socket from basically collapsing in on itself.

He looked through the catalogue of different designs for eyes, as his parents left to go argue loudly outside his hospital room.

“If you can’t be bothered to look after them the two days a week you get them, then maybe you shouldn’t have any visitation!” his dad screamed.

“Oh you’d just love that!” his mom shot back. “You’d love to cut me completely out of my babies’ lives!”

“You aren’t even in their lives! You leave them to fend for themselves in that fire hazard of a cabin you call a house, and look what happened! We’re lucky the girls found him before he bled out or froze to death!”

“I’m sorry, I assumed your son was smart enough not to go wandering around at night and run face-first into a tree branch!”

Antinous would try to explain what really happened, but nobody believed him. Not until he went back to school three weeks later and told Amphinomus, his only actual friend. But that was okay; adults were assholes anyway. They never believed him about anything. Not getting called names, not about the weird art teacher that gave the girls the creeps, and now not about there being a monster in the woods.

Later, when he had a mental breakdown at seventeen and got three kinds of diagnosed, his parents used his insistence that it was a monster to say that they should have seen the signs that he was sick much sooner. Antinous had long since stopped insisting that he knew what he saw, knew what had happened to him, but it still stung. The implication that just because he was a little angrier than most people, had a little more trouble with emotional regulation, that he’d also have lost his grip on reality.

(The seroquel that he didn’t really need sat heavy on his tongue. He took it for two years before they decided his hands had started shaking too much, and let him come off of it.)

No, he knew what reality was. Some people deserved to get their lights punched out, some people shouldn’t be art teachers, and there was a fucking monster in the woods.

He never went back into them, and two years after the incident, his mom sold the house and left town.

*

They all ended up sleeping in the RV. Eurymachus and Amphinomus on one bed, and Peisistratus, Telemachus, and Antinous smushed together on the other. Antinous herded them against the wall, so that he was at the front in case someone or something managed to get inside.

Really, he was practically on top of them, like a hen guarding her eggs. Not that either of them wanted to complain, not when it was a way of instantly telling their wrecked nervous systems that they were all three still there, still curled up together. Not outside bleeding into the thin layer of snow that stubbornly remained on the ground.

Telemachus lay there, under Antinous’ heavy arm, Peisistratus a barnacle on his side, and stared up at the roof of the RV.

He…didn’t know where to go from here. He’d tried to comfort Antinous as he told his story, resting their arms together on the table, but his words had completely failed him. Peisistratus had said something that was suitably kind and supportive, but Telemachus still felt like his head was full of bees. Like he was still being fucking watched.

He managed to wiggle out from under the other two, and grab his backpack. They’d brought in as much of their stuff as they could, so that they wouldn’t be tempted to go back outside. He pulled his bag of medication out, and went for the bottle of his emergency anxiety meds, to be taken when there was an imminent panic attack. Antinous had taken something similar, though it was a different prescription. Something heavier.

Telemachus swallowed the pill dry, and almost immediately regretted it. Really, there was a water bottle right there, why did he do this to himself–

And then Antinous was there, arms wrapped around Telemachus.

“Come sleep. You’re making me paranoid,” he said, his voice slightly slurred by sleep and his medication.

“I’m just thinking,” Telemachus murmured. “If it was the same type of thing as what attacked you when you were a kid, then why didn’t it just rip open the tent? Certainly it could have, if it wanted to. Why did it have to trick us to come outside? Like, it makes sense it couldn’t get into a house, that’s four actual walls made of wood or brick or whatever. But the tent is just a couple layers of nylon.”

Chin resting on top of Telemachus’ head, Antinous considered this. Then, slowly, he unwrapped his arms and grabbed for his own bag, pulling open the front compartment and pulling out…a little doll.

“Coffee guy, Leander, he gave me this when I said we were coming out here. He told me he and his girlfriend got this for protection shortly before their trip. Said its name is Myuri.”

The doll was about five inches high, made of denim. The head was topped with hair made of pink string, and it was completely featureless. The sewing on it was crude, but that was probably part of its charm.

“What, he gave you a poppet?” Telemachus asked, a little hysterical at it, taking the doll to turn over in his hands. It was filled with rice, and smelled like incense.

“He described it as ‘a little friend’. I don’t know, I’m not really into this magic junk. I just thought it looked cool, so I kept it.”

“I’m not either,” Telemachus said. “I mean, there’s a huge overlap of the queer community and the pagan community here, but I was only ever in the former. Sophia was sort of witchy, but I was never sure if she actually did witchcraft or was just really goth.”

“Your ex girlfriend,” Antinous noted.

“Eh, more of a situationship that outstayed its welcome.”

“She’s an asshole anyway,” Peisistratus cut in from the bed. Once again, Telemachus and Antinous both jumped, having not realized he was awake.

“Jesus, you scared me,” Telemachus said with a weak laugh, reaching over to bonk Peisistratus on the ankle.

“Seriously, I went to Rally’s with her and some of PFLAG right after I turned twenty-one, and she was a huge asshole the entire night. Some woman wanted to play pool with us, and Sophia jumped down her fucking throat. Thank god y’all had already called it off, or I would not have beaten the mother hen allegations with how fast I’d have said to leave her ass.”

“You aren’t beating the mother hen allegations,” Telemachus told him.

Peisistratus waved his hand like he was going to smack Telemachus upside the head, but was too tired to actually sit up.

“You two come back to bed, we’ll deal with this shit when we’re awake enough to be people.”

It was half-past noon by the time Telemachus woke up again, and his brain was still sluggish from the anxiety meds.

The night before didn’t feel real. It felt dreamlike, as if he’d had the mother of all sleep-paralysis hallucinations and made the whole thing up. However, judging by how slow Antinous was also moving, hardly saying a word as he ate dry cereal by the handful, he wasn’t the only one who experienced it.

“I take it I’m driving,” Amphinomus said as they were just about finished cleaning up the campsite. He’d just watched Antinous fail to pick up a cup from the ground twice before the latter had finally been able to grab it.

“Unless you wan’ a fiery explosion death, then yes,” Antinous told him, shoving the cup into his hands. He then went back into the RV to collapse again.

Telemachus made a mental note to push back if the doctor ever suggested the same meds as Antinous had taken. His meds were basically strong antihistamines, but it seemed Antinous was on some kind of tranquilizer. Given the tragic backstory pileup that was Antinous’ childhood, however, Telemachus couldn’t exactly blame him for occasionally needing to unperson, but Telemachus didn’t like the idea of being so woozy the next day.

It had started snowing again after they’d gone back to bed, and the entire campsite was covered in an inch-thick layer of the stuff. It had started to get a crunchy ice shell as it was melted by the sun, then refroze because the temperature dropped. Telemachus was even more thankful that he’d snagged his bag and brought it into the RV, as he looked out onto the glittering canvas.

They got everything as picked up as possible, given the circumstances, and soon they were all- except Antinous, who was still passed out- standing by the firepit, staring at each other.

“So. You really didn’t hear anything?” Telemachus eventually asked.

“I sleep like the dead,” Amphinomus shrugged. “I have slept through a car crash before.”

“I wear noise canceling headphones.” Eurymachus said.

“He’s secretly the most diva of us three,” Amphinomus added, flashing a grin as Eurymachus immediately shoved him.

“Do you believe us?” Peisistratus pushed, one hand twisted in the sleeve of his coat, thumb nail scratching at the fabric in a grounding motion. He flicked his eyes up to them, but then stared back down at the ground. As the one who least believed in this sort of thing, and as the only one of the three who wasn’t on some sort of anti-anxiety meds, he was taking things pretty hard.

Telemachus grabbed the hand that wasn’t clenched in fabric, giving it a soothing squeeze.

“For what it’s worth, yeah,” Amphinomus said. “We’ve never had a technological failure like that before. The cameras and the motion sensing lights both dying at the same time. And I know Antinous, I know he doesn’t freak out easily. Last night was the first time in three months that he actually took his emergency panic meds, and the first time in years I’ve seen him take a whole one.”

“I can see why,” Telemachus said.

“Yeah, they’re a lot,” Amphinomus nodded. “He probably won’t really wake up until tomorrow. I mean, I’ll bully him awake enough to eat, but he’s not going to remember it.”

“What do you think it could actually be?” Peisistratus asked. “I mean, there’s lots of things that are supposed to be able to copy voices to lure people into traps. I know Antinous is leaning towards a…” he paused, suddenly realizing he shouldn’t use the word in the middle of the woods if it was potentially real and also there.

“Wendy-boy,” he decided, “but I do think he’s right that we don’t get the kind of starvation circumstances needed to create one. Unless they can travel?” he added, unsure.

“Dunno, actually. Haven’t really looked at the myths behind them,” Amphinomus admitted. “There’s also all this misinformation about them, you know? They aren’t weird deer monsters or whatever, but that’s all that gets portrayed in movies and such.”

“Like in Hannibal,” Telemachus nodded.

“Right! I think the closest a piece of media got to what Anti saw back then was fucking Until Dawn. Like you mentioned last week,” Amphinomus said, bumping Peisistratus on the shoulder.

“So, the one with the lore closest enough to mean that one could be created here, regardless of how far south we are?” Peisistratus noted, dryly. “Because if you get trapped in a cave, it doesn’t matter if it’s not freezing fucking cold, you starve anyway. Who knows how many people have died here over the last few thousands of years.”

They collectively shuddered at that. It was easy to forget that, for all the modern safety measures, the wilderness was still absolutely dangerous, even without some sort of monster stalking around in the woods.

They drove back home in silence, Peisistratus and Telemachus in the pickup truck, the podcasters in their RV. When Peisistratus could spare it, they spent most of that trip clasping hands so tightly their knuckles went white.

By the time they got home, Telemachus had finally begun the process of compartmentalizing the whole experience, so he was able to smile and act normal around his mother. He sort of wanted to tell her everything that happened, but a few things stopped him.

One was that he didn’t really know what had happened. Outside of the woods, it was easier to talk himself around to the idea that everything was a pile of coincidences that simply made it seem like they had a paranormal encounter. Maybe the chili was off, or maybe the cameras dying had played back their voices or something. Maybe it was the power of suggestion, and a mass hallucination. After all, sleep paralysis did give him some wild hallucinations. Like the time he’d dreamed being abducted by aliens, or being possessed by a demon. The former of which he’d only broken out of because Jazzercise had jumped onto his chest and woken him up.

The other reason was…his grandfather. Who’d dealt with schizophrenia since he was only a couple years older than Telemachus now was. He’d visited the man in the care home a few times- not frequently, since they were a couple states away from where he was- and always felt weird. Worried. It was a genetic condition, after all. His mother would probably take him straight to a psychiatrist to be evaluated, and he didn’t really want to deal with that on top of everything else.

Eventually, laying on his bed, he got sick of doing absolutely nothing, and pulled out his phone.

Tele: Hey, this is gonna sound maybe weird, but where did you get that little doll you gave Antinous?

Leander (PFLAG): Oh! Did you go camping too? I’m surprised they didn’t wait and come back at least late spring. Yeah, I forgot where we got Myuri, lemme ask Hiro.

Telemachus waited for the reply, scrolling through various cryptid-hunting subreddits until he felt insane. Finally, a text notification came through.

Leander (PFLAG): Yeah, Hiro said she got it from Sophia. I think it’s handmade? If you want one yourself, she recently started working at Page Of Cups, so you could catch her there and ask.

Telemachus sent a quick thank you, then turned and screamed into his pillow. Fuck, he did not want his ass to have been saved by fucking Sophia of all people.

Chapter Text

Telemachus waited until the next day to call up Antinous and give him the bad news.

“Feeling any better?” he asked first, once he heard the other man on the line.

“Much,” Antinous said. He sounded better, if Telemachus could trust the way the phone carried his voice. Faintly bemused and relieved. “Slept for another twelve hours, got force-fed grilled cheese and tomato soup. What you calling me for, Little Wolf?”

“So, I have a proposition for you,” Telemachus began.

“Oh, please do proposition me,” Antinous interrupted, laughing at the indignant noise Telemachus made.

“You are impossible,” Telemachus informed him. “I’m trying to ask if you’ll come with me to the pagan shop so we can ask about the doll, and maybe see what the witchy scene has to say about whatever it was we encountered. If anyone knows about weird cryptids in the woods, it’s them.”

“Y’all have a pagan shop?”

“Yeah, Page Of Cups. They sell all sorts of herbs and crystals and books there. I’ve never been one to believe in that kind of thing, but since there might really be terrifying things in the woods, I figured we should at least take a look. The problem though, and why I don’t want to go alone, is that Sophia works there and apparently is the one who made Myuri.”

“So, you want some arm candy to make her jealous?” Antinous asked.

“Maybe a little,” Telemachus admitted. “It’s mostly that I don’t like talking to her without backup, though. Peisistratus is at work, or I’d ask him to come too. Also, I think it might make an interesting aside for your podcast. A little local flair while you’re still in town.”

Antinous hummed, considering this. “Yeah, it would make for a neat little mention while I’m figuring out my angle. I’m not sure how I’m going to report on the camping incident, if I’m honest. We don’t have any real evidence, and I’ve talked about having taken antipsychotics on the show before, so there would be a heavy handful of skepticism. I don’t want to push too hard on it and alienate the less credulous viewers.”

Telemachus made a sympathetic noise. “Yeah, I can see how that would be difficult. The cameras dying like they did makes proving it basically impossible, and unfortunately I don’t think eyewitness testimony is much help when trying to convince people that monsters are real.”

“The closest I’ve gotten to these things since I was a baby, and I’m gonna sound insane if I bring it up on my own fucking show,” Antinous groaned. There was the sound of springs as he apparently fell back onto the bed. He gave a deep sigh.

“But yes, I’ll go with you to the pagan shop,” he added.

“Thank you. It closes at six, so grab me after lunch?”

“Sounds like a plan, wolfie. See you in about ten minutes.”

“Ten minutes? Your Airbnb is not that close to…you’re outside my house again, aren’t you?” Telemachus sighed.

“Yup. The ten minutes is just for me to finish my lunch,” Antinous said, followed by an obnoxious slurping noise. “I made ramen.”

“See you in ten,” Telemachus conceded with a groan.

He hung up and hustled, slipping out of his room to rummage through the fridge. He found some leftover pasta that he hurriedly heated and wolfed down. He’d just finished putting his bowl in the dishwasher when there was a knocking at his door.

Telemachus stuffed his feet into his shoes as he skidded towards the door, stopping for just a second to look at the drawer where he kept his stash of medical grade weed and assorted paraphernalia. (The recreational stuff was in his room) With a sigh, he left it. As much as he’d like to take the edge off his anxiety, he didn’t want to risk another incident like the one on their first hike. He did, however, stick his emergency migraine meds into his pocket. Just in case seeing Sophia pissed him off enough that his brain tried to kill him again.

Finally, he swung the door open, just as Antinous was raising his hand to knock a second time.

“I had to eat too,” Telemachus explained as he shut and locked the door behind him. “We taking the RV or the wolf van?”

“Wolf van,” Antinous said. “Amphi and Eury are keeping an eye out in the RV,” he added, pointing over his shoulder to where the RV was. Eurymachus was sticking his head out of the passenger side, smoking a cigarette. He gave a laconic little wave.

Being in the wolf van was weird as hell. Telemachus had to move the seat up several notches before he felt like he wasn’t halfway into the back, and could see well enough through the windshield to give directions.

“Why do you all have to be giants,” Telemachus complained once the seat was adjusted.

“Why do you have to be a gnome?” Antinous shot back at him.

Telemachus flipped him off.

Page Of Cups had apparently expanded since he’d last visited its herbal-scented walls. It had a second room for only books, and a separate little area for dressing spell candles and getting your fortune read.

At first, Telemachus didn’t see Sophia at all, and thought he’d gotten lucky and would be able to ask the other store employees to just text her about it instead, saving him the trouble of having to talk to her himself. But then he spotted her in that second room, behind a counter that held some of the more pricey books.

“Well, well, well,” she drawled, fixing her gaze on Telemachus from behind her glasses, resting her chin on one talon-ed hand. “I thought you said this stuff was ‘a little too woo’ for your tastes? You finally have your witchy awakening, or did you just come by to see my face?”

Unfortunately, she still looked great, in her black corset-style top and combat boots, lipstick blood red and eyes thickly lined in black. Even more unfortunately, he couldn’t call her a heinous bitch when he needed her on his side.

“Apparently there’s more truth to it than I gave it credit for,” Telemachus said, just barely managing to not sound like it came from between gritted teeth.

“Well, hello there,” she added, looking directly at Antinous, eyes going up then back down. “New friend of yours?”

“Something like that,” Antinous said, wrapping one arm almost possessively around Telemachus’ waist.

Sophia stared at them both for a long moment, obviously considering something, but in the end she let it go and didn’t say whatever mean girl bullshit she’d been considering.

“Seriously though, what are you doing here?” she asked, leaning back into her chair and tossing her feet up to rest on the counter.

Telemachus looked to Antinous, who pulled the poppet out of his pocket and set it on the counter.

“Well, Leander gave us this as supposed protection, and he said he and Hiro got it from you,” Telemachus told her.

Her feet hit the floor once more, and she straightened up. “I didn’t make it, so if it didn’t work, don’t blame me,” Sophia said, words clipped.

Telemachus blinked, a little taken aback. “Okay, then who did?” he asked.

“Neo made it. He’s the one with the sewing machine, I just thought that Hiro and Leander needed a little boost, since they were hiking into spooky territory, you know? Didn’t think they’d regift,” she scoffed.

“It’s known to be spooky?” Antinous asked. He said it softly, almost contemplative.

“I mean, yeah. There’s lots of spooky shit all over Arkansas. I mean, the Ozarks may not be as well known for their hauntings as Appalachia is, but these mountains are still pretty fucking old. Add in the caves, and you get a prime target for haunted and creepy.”

“What do you think it is?” Antinous pressed, hand on the counter and leaning in. Sophia automatically leaned back, even though Antinous’ posture was more curious and invested than it was intimidating. Telemachus tapped at his elbow and he seemed to realize he was crowding her, and backed up a bit.

“Could be a lot of things, but my guess, and I’m currently behind enough wards to say this candidly, would be a Skinwalker,” Sophia said, still glaring.

“Interesting,” Antinous said, visibly eyeing the white sage bundles hanging on the wall behind her. He clearly didn’t agree with her diagnosis of the situation. Telemachus didn’t know enough about skinwalkers to tell one way or the other, though, hence why he was asking in the first place.

“Well, thanks for your help,” Telemachus interjected quickly, before Sophia had time to say anything more. “Oh, though I did want to ask Neo a question. Where’s he living these days?”

Anything to get out of having to talk to her more. She hadn’t been that bad this conversation, but he remembered how she could verbally eviscerate someone at the drop of a hat, and he wanted none of that thank you.

Sophia, eyebrow twitching in aggravation, waved one hand dismissively. “Same place he has been, probably. I’m the one that moved out. You need the address again?” she asked, in a flat tone of voice that said she wasn’t going to give it to him if he had forgotten it.

“I still remember it, thanks,” Telemachus shrugged, grabbing Antinous by the elbow to yank him out of the store, grabbing Myuri as they left.

“White sage is sacred. And endangered,” Antinous said, amused, as soon as they were back in the van “I mean, I’m not one to care that much, but it makes the whole store look uninformed. Also, I don’t think this state has enough of a Navajo presence to really be worried about skinwalkers. It feels like a cop-out to say ‘it’s totes an evil witch’ or something.”

“Well, we can always go ask Neo,” Telemachus told him. “He always seemed more down to earth than Sophia did. Maybe he has a better idea.”

“Who is Neo, anyway?” Antinous asked, turning the key to start the van back up.

“Sophia's ex partner. The one that broke up with her shortly before the shibari exhibition.”

“Ah. Well, hopefully he was as cool with things as you say, or this is going to be an extremely awkward meeting,” Antinous said.

“It’s going to be awkward regardless,” Telemachus informed him brightly. “Take a left out of the parking lot, then left again at the next traffic light. His place is only fifteen minutes from here.”

The house was about the same as it had been the last time Telemachus had visited, with a slightly overgrown lawn, a carport full of in-progress chairs that Neo was repairing, and a tiny herb garden by the front door.

What was different, aside from the lack of Sophia’s car in the driveway, was that someone was leaned up against the front door, smoking, who was dressed like…

“Keith fuckin’ Kogane?” Telemachus mumbled under his breath.

“What?” Antinous asked, incredulously.

“The person. They’re cosplaying Keith from Voltron,” Telemachus said.

“Never watched that one. That sci-fi anime from the 80s, right?”

“They’re dressed as the version from the 2016 remake. I’m surprised you missed it, it was all over the internet back then.”

“I was too busy. That was when the fuckening happened re: my life,” Antinous said.

The person dressed as Keith Kogane waved with their cigarette, giving the van a perplexed look as they leaned back and gave the door a sharp knock. In order to not look like suspicious weirdos, Antinous and Telemachus went ahead and got out of the van and headed towards said door.

When they got close enough that everyone could see each other’s faces, Telemachus relaxed.

“Oh, hey Clio, I almost didn’t recognize you outside of the convention. You and Callie visiting?” he asked.

Clio stubbed out their cigarette, giving a surprised little half-grin. “It’s D&D night. Thought you were the rest of our party, but I guess they’re running late. Also hi, I see Telemachus has expanded his circle of friend,” they added, nodding to Antinous.

Antinous snorted, giving a lazy little wave.

“Hey!” Telemachus interjected, though he was laughing, “I have more than the one! This is Antinous, he’s in town for a couple of weeks. Antinous, this is Clio, we used to be part of the same cosplay group. Anyways. We were just dropping by to ask Neo something, so we’ll get out of y’alls way in a minute,” he told Clio.

With impeccable timing, Neo opened the door, poking his head out. He saw Telemachus and waved, a surprisingly sincere smile turning up the sides of his mouth.

“Long time no see!” he called cheerfully. “Come in before you freeze to death. Callie, sweetheart that she is, made cookies,” he added, his slight Ozark accent poking through in a way it had rarely done when he and Sophia were together.

Neo was wearing fake elf ears and an outfit that was not suited to the February chill. It involved short shorts, a size-too-small cropped binder, and not much else. His flaming red hair was only about halfway contained under a wig cap. Out of the corner of his eye, Telemachus saw Antinous’ gaze flick appreciatively to the bared stomach and cleavage before quickly pretending it hadn’t. Thankfully, Neo was the oblivious sort and missed it entirely. Telemachus bit back an amused snort.

Telemachus introduced the two of them on the way into the house and to the kitchen.

The inside of the house had changed more than the outside. They had a bigger couch now, and there were guitars and swords hung on the walls. Telemachus vaguely remembered that Neo’s dad was part of some local band or the other. Telemachus assumed he'd gotten the man’s décor after he'd died a few years back and finally got around to putting it up.

Callie, her hair pink instead of the blue it had been last time they’d hung out, was sat at the dining table, pouring over a map and her notebook. She was still wearing her work uniform instead of a costume, unlike Neo and her boygirlfriend (Clio’s preferred term of endearment), but she was also wearing a pair of elf ears.

“I swear, if you have us spending yet another session lost in the woods,” Callie said without looking up from the map, “then I am finding a way to tpk the whole part- oh, hey, Tele, long time no see. You wanna watch Neo psychologically torture us for a couple hours?”

“Y’all could have been out of the forest two sessions ago if you’d just listened to that guy with the pet snakes,” Neo told her.

“I can’t really stick around, no,” Telemachus said. “We’re just here to ask Neo something.”

“What was it you needed to ask?” Neo prodded, handing them each a very large sugar cookie.

Telemachus gave Antinous a nod, and he pulled the little doll out from his bag, where they’d stuffed it after making their hasty retreat.

Immediately, Neo’s eyes lit up.

“Myuri! Oh my god, I thought we lost her when we moved from our last apartment! Where did you find her?” he asked, taking the doll from Antinous and inspecting it, almost reverentially, before he handed it back.

Telemachus gave a quick explanation of the chain of custody as he knew it, and watched as Neo’s grin grew resigned, tired, and a little sad.

“Yeah, that tracks. Sophia swore she didn’t know where Myuri went, but I guess that’s what you get when your supposed life partner is a pathological liar,” he bit out bitterly. After a second he jolted, as if he hadn’t meant to say all of that.

“Oh, I’m sorry, that was super rude. I don’t even know if you guys still meet up or whatever, I shouldn’t poison the well like that.”

Callie scoffed. “She’s an asshole who left you high and dry, she doesn’t deserve the consideration. You could have lost the house!”

“She was between jobs at the time,” Neo said, defensively.

“Wait, she’s the one who left? She told me you were the one who broke up with her,” Telemachus spoke up. “And no, we don’t really talk. Feel free to complain about her as much as you want.”

“She fucking what?” Clio coughed, striding into the room with their extinguished cigarette. “No, the bitch grabbed her shit and left while Neo was at therapy, and tried to tell us all that he was a narcissist that she had to sneak away from. She can fully go and fuck herself.”

“Really? She acted all mad because the breakup happened right before that shibari demonstration and you wouldn’t be her guinea pig for it anymore.”

Neo looked even more confused. “I was never going to do the demo with her. I don’t like the club she was part of at the time; their main organizer gave me the creeps, so I didn’t especially feel like stripping down to my skivvies so Soph could tie me up in front of them. She said she had a friend from the club who was doing the demo with her.”

“I ended up doing it,” Telemachus shrugged. “Found a new kink,” he added as a joke, to lighten the mood a little bit. It didn’t really work, but he at least tried.

“Anyways, about Myuri?” he asked, hoping to bring the conversation back around.

“Oh, one second,” Neo said, half-jogging out of the kitchen, rummaging around on his bookcase for something.

“Apparently Sophia fully left this behind when she was stealing my shit,” Neo said, coming back with two pieces of cloth. He took Myuri from Antinous again and fiddled with it for a moment before he handed it back, now wearing a sparkly black bandana and dress.

“There! Now she’s complete. Originally I made her to be protection for our apartment, back when we lived right off the bike trail. It was near this creek, and weird things always happened by it, you know? Fun, very haunted times.”

“Do you…want her back?” Antinous asked hesitantly.

“Oh, no, you keep her. If she made her way to you, you’re intended to have her,” Neo said, going back to the stove to continue stirring a deeply, disturbingly red soup.

In all honesty, Neo seemed much brighter and happier than Telemachus ever saw him back when Sophia and he had still been an item. He’d always been nice to Telemachus, but he tended to shrink away into his art room whenever he could.

Telemachus gave him the rundown of everything that had happened in the last few days, including their conversation with Sophia at the magic store.

Neo hummed thoughtfully, taking a quick taste of the very, very red soup. “I mean, there’s a lot of things it could be. I don’t disagree that it could be a skinwalker or a wendigo, but I don’t think a simple house spirit like Myuri would have kept those at bay. And what would a skinwalker even want? They aren’t mindless monsters or anything, they’re people with goals. A wendigo would want to eat you, sure, but again, doubtful that Myuri could really do anything about one. Now, what I really think it could be is some variety of fae.”

“When we were initially investigating one of our thoughts was a kelpie,” Antinous mentioned.

Neo rapped the spoon at the edge of the stove. “Kelpie! Those little bastards! Hey, Callie, do you still have my copy of my faerie encyclopedia?”

“It’s actually right here,” Callie informed him, moving aside her notebook to show it. “I was reading a few entries to see if I could figure out what monster Neo is having the party fight this next session.”

“It’s not in there,” Neo said, maybe a little smug.

“Well you stole my monster manual, so I’m working with what I’ve got,” she shot back at him. “You gonna let them borrow it?”

“Yeah. If you guys want it, take it. Drop it back off when you’ve vanquished the beastie or whatever.”

“Yes please,” Telemachus accepted eagerly. “Thanks. Hopefully this means I can continue to avoid Sophia like the plague.”

“Good,” Neo said definitively. “Honestly I was super uncomfortable with the age gap, but she had me so twisted around that I didn’t feel like I could say anything.”

Telemachus felt his gaze go to Antinous for the tiniest fraction of a second.

“Well, I mean, five years isn’t that much. And it’s not like we were dating seriously or anything, we were just kind of fooling around,” Telemachus said.

“Five years?” Clio squawked, their voice raising several octaves. “Honey baby sweetie, Sophia is thirty as of last October.”

“And she said you two were serious,” Neo added. “That’s actually one of the reasons I felt I couldn’t say anything, that she claimed she really liked you. If I had thought she was just using you for sex, I would have said something. You’d just turned eighteen, for crying out loud.”

The kitchen fell into uncomfortable silence.

“Oh,” Telemachus managed, after a long moment. “You really did mean pathological liar, huh?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Neo said softly. “And, for the record, you’re right that five years isn’t nearly as weird as ten,” he continued, giving a significant glance to Antinous. “Still a little bit weird though.”

But he added a little half grin at that, so he was probably joking.

Later, back in the wolf van, Telemachus was running his fingers over the embossed lettering of the book’s front cover, thinking, letting the atmosphere grow awkward and tense because he didn’t really know what to do or say to break it.

Eventually, Antinous was the one who actually broke it.

“Do you have a therapist?” he asked.

“Uh-huh,” Telemachus intoned. “I see her every two weeks, unless I have crisis events.”

“You should probably call her. That was a lot. I mean, I almost feel like calling my therapist, and I wasn’t even in that relationship.”

“It wasn’t…okay, maybe it was a little bit a relationship,” Telemachus sighed. “Unbeknownst to me, apparently.”

“Do you just not want a serious relationship, or just not with her?” Antinous asked. He was probably going for nonchalance, but he was missing the mark and sounded entirely too chalant.

“You gonna be weird about my answer if I’m honest?” Telemachus asked back. They were near enough to his house now that, should Antinous get weird about it, he could jump out at the next light and finish making his own way home.

“Be honest. I’ve got a thick skin these days,” Antinous told him.

“Well, you know I have feelings for Peisistratus,” he started.

“Oh yes, I certainly know that,” Antinous cut in, wryly.

“It’s just that I wouldn’t be a good partner to anyone while I’m crushing so hard on Peisistratus,” Telemachus admitted. “It would be so unfair. Because it might fade if I was serious about someone, but it might not. And if it doesn’t, what then? Break up? Keep pining? It’s just heartbreak waiting to happen. And even if I stayed together with them, who wants a partner halfway in love with someone else? No one is that unburdened by jealousy. They’d have me cut him off, and I just can’t do that.”

“Just ask Peisistratus out,” was Antinous’ suggestion, accompanied by a long-suffering sigh.

“I can’t! I’ve tried, so many fucking times! I just keep chickening out last minute, or my anxiety takes over so hard that it triggers a migraine, and no one wants to date someone who is currently vomiting in front of them and can barely stand. And even if I did, and we started going out, what if it all falls apart? Peisistratus has been in my life since I was a baby, our families are intertwined. And yeah, that makes it easier if we work out. But if we don’t, we might rip apart everything, and I can’t lose any more people.”

They’d pulled into the driveway of Telemachus’ house, but they sat there for a long few minutes, Telemachus frantically scrubbing at his eyes to try and stop the tears that he wished weren’t appearing.

“I said this to…someone else. Rather recently, actually,” Antinous said. “Amphinomus and I dated for almost the entirety of our freshman year of high school. We didn’t work out, and the breakup wasn’t the cleanest thing in the world. But he’s one of my best friends, and we decided not to let that whole thing ruin what we had. You have to choose to not let it fuck things up, you know?”

Silence reigned for another minute or so as Telemachus considered this.

“I still don’t think I can do it,” Telemachus admitted.

“Well, what if someone came along who didn’t mind you and your pining?” Antinous asked. “Like, someone who was more open minded? Like how Neo didn’t mind that his girlfriend was also dating you, what if you found someone who thought the idea of you and Peisistratus getting together too was hot?”

Telemachus snorted a laugh. “Unfortunately, I don’t think Arkansas has that many polyamorous people just wandering around. The few I’ve met are either uninterested or assholes, too, so I think I’ve just got bad luck on that front. And who’s to say Peisistratus would ever go for it either!”

“…There is that,” Antinous admitted. He was staring into the distance at nothing, tapping one hand against the steering wheel in the rhythm of some song Telemachus didn’t know, chewing on his tongue as he thought something through. After a moment, he sighed.

“Just think about it, alright? About asking him out. I am growing nauseous watching you two be idiots about each other.”

“Hey!” Telemachus said, not actually that offended but feeling like he had to pretend to be.

“Now get the fuck out of my car,” Antinous told him.

Telemachus rolled his eyes, but got the fuck out of the van, flipping Antinous off as he did so. It earned a grin from the man.

Antinous watched Telemachus get inside, because he had manners and shit, before he flung himself into the back of the van to grab a spare pillow to scream into.

Operation: Two Twink Boyfriends Who Are Also Boyfriends was proving to be like pulling fucking teeth. Gods these two were absolutely the most stubborn jackasses he’d ever met- and yes, he’d met his own damn self.

To be fair, his plan had been frantically scribbled down on a napkin after they’d left that Mexican restaurant like a week ago, so it wasn’t like he had a whole Machiavellian scheme going on. His initial assumption had been that Telemachus was just normal level oblivious, and just needed a push in the right direction. But one conversation with Peisistratus had quickly revealed that neither of these boys could communicate worth a damn. And Peisistratus was the worse one! He knew the feelings were mutual and just decided he wasn’t going to fix it because a twenty-year-old just hadn’t had a serious relationship yet. No one’s teenage relationships were really all that serious, and if they thought they were, it was because they were a teenager.

At least Telemachus already had experience with poly, that would make things easier, he’d thought to himself back then, like a fucking fool. When the experience is bad, it turns you off from the idea.

Antinous screamed into the pillow one last time, and pulled out his phone. Time to tweak the plan a bit.

Chapter Text

Peisistratus stared at himself in the bathroom mirror, trying to make himself leave and continue his job. He’d been in there for nearly twenty minutes, and his absence would be noticed soon.

“You are the manager,” he told himself, shoving his hair back from where some had escaped his ponytail. “You need to stop hiding in here and go and deal with things. You can’t quit; Nausicaa does not make enough to pay rent on her own.” His reflection did not look impressed.

It wasn’t the most cheerful of pep-talks, but it got him to finally leave the bathroom. Just in time too, because the second he opened the door, his walkie-talkie crackled to life.

“Hey Housekeeping, we need inventory done for a new admit in room 405.”

Peisistratus sighed out his existential dread, then pressed the talk button.

“I’ll be right there, let me just grab my label maker!” he said cheerfully into the mic. Technically that was a job for the housekeeping head, but she was on lunch. Even more technically, it was supposed to be the laundry manager who did it if head of housekeeping wasn’t there, but they never actually did, so it fell onto Peisistratus to get it done instead.

The thing was, Peisistratus didn’t think this was what he was meant to be doing. Sure, he felt useful working for the retirement home. He was making a tangible difference in the lives of the residents that lived there, keeping their space clean and organized. And he liked most of the residents, even if he didn’t appreciate that the nutrition department still gave Kathy in room 106 Kool-Aid and other red foods when she so clearly had an allergy to the red dye. He’d get called in at least twice a day to clean up the aftermath.

But he didn’t really enjoy the work. It was difficult, tedious, and he felt like he had to scrub his skin off every time he left. Unfortunately for him, there weren’t many jobs he could get with his associates degree in this small town. And he didn’t really want to leave it, not when all of his favorite people were there. His parents, his siblings, Nausicaa. Telemachus, who wanted to leave even less. Hell, Telemachus barely left the block, let alone the city. The state was a complete non-starter.

(Maybe one day Peisistratus would interrogate why he was determined never to go where Telemachus wouldn’t follow, but today was not that day.)

Telemachus hadn’t always been bound in place. Peisistratus had a childhood full of memories of vacations and adventures. Any time one family had booked a trip, an extra ticket was bought. Because obviously Peisistratus and Telemachus would be miserable without the other by their side. And maybe there had been a strong handful of marriage jokes before Telemachus came out, and maybe Nestor had joked that at least the marriage equality decision had happened once he did. And maybe Peisistratus had acted soooo embarrassed by his dad making those jokes, but secretly thought, well, what if?

Hypothetically.

Theoretically.

Just maybe, okay?

Peisistratus finished labeling 405’s impressive collection of tap shoes with no real memory of getting the label maker, or any of the frankly obscene amount of labeling he’d just been doing. He’d just blinked, and was standing there with the last pair in his hands.

God, he needed to go to lunch before he lost his everloving mind.

He put the shoes in the closet, dropped off the label maker in the housekeeping office, and swapped out his single ear bud for his fuck-off-I’m-on-break headphones on his way to the break room, thankfully empty at this time of day. If one of his coworkers tried to talk to him, he was seventy percent sure he’d just bite them.

He stared into the void for the minute and thirty seconds it took to heat up the lasagna he’d brought, yet was still startled when the timer went off.

Peisistratus sighed at himself as he pulled the container from the microwave. Maybe he should have taken the day off after the…incident in the woods, but he couldn’t do that to his team. Or to his paycheck. He’d never considered himself a skeptic, but he certainly hadn’t expected that. He’d expected they’d get some explainable but weird-seeming phenomena, the podcaster trio would exaggerate it for views, and things would move on.

Well, things were still going to move on, at least. His view of the world was changed, but that didn’t stop it from spinning.

It had been too dark for Peisistratus to make out the silhouette of the whatever-it-was that had been outside the tent, though he’d heard those scratches clear as day coming from the wall of fabric behind Telemachus. God, he was never letting Telemachus sleep on the fucking outside like that again, he was going to be thoroughly sandwiched in the middle for maximum safety.

Wait. Scratch that. They were never going to get into a situation like that ever fucking again. Which was going to be a hard sell if Telemachus had gotten a taste for adrenaline and danger, but considering he’d maxed out his anxiety and migraine dosage that night, Peisistratus highly doubted that. Unless Telemachus got it in his head that he was doing something noble, in which case Peisistratus was screwed. There’d be no talking him out of it then.

His phone chirped at him, interrupting the song he was damaging his eardrums with.

Antinous: Hey, boy scout. You me and Wolfie need to talk plan of action. Personally, I gotta make some kinda lemonade out of this whole thing, so I’ve got to head back to the woods. You guys don’t have to come with, but I want you two to know everything I’m planning. Meet up tonight at Tele’s house?

Peisistratus typed up a quick affirmation of yes, he’d do that, and then he noticed another notification. A little notice from his photo storage app that was reminding him of pictures that had been taken on this day eight years ago. He opened it to see which pictures they had been, mildly curious and hoping to snap himself out of this fugue he was stuck in.

They were a little blurry, since he’d been thirteen and bad at picture taking, but they were clear enough. It was a series of four photos of Telemachus and his father, both hunched over video game controllers, very obviously yelling at each other. Though clearly Odysseus was laughing. In one, Telemachus had one socked foot stuck out to shove at his father’s side. The next, Telemachus had fallen over because his dad had grabbed his foot and yanked it.

It was very shortly after Telemachus had first come out. His hair was in that awkward just-cut stage, and he’d been flirting with the idea of still wearing more feminine clothing. He was wearing a sunflower sweater in the pictures, one with a scoop neck that he had to wear a tank-top underneath to make it school appropriate, because heavens forbid people find out he had shoulders.

Peisistratus sighed, a small smile ticking up his face. He remembered that day, remembered how competitive Telemachus had been. It was one of those rare times when Odysseus had a week off, and he’d spent that entire week with Telemachus- and sometimes Peisistratus- doing father-son bonding to make up for how hectic and busy he was the other fifty-one weeks of the year.

Another text came through, also from Antinous.

Antinous: btw, Tele has offered his stash for our perusal, should you want to take the edge off with us ; p

Peisistratus swiped the notification away, paranoid for a moment that a coworker could sneak up behind him and read it. He was still alone in the break room, thankfully.

Peisistratus: …Maybe.

He finished his lunch, and put himself back together to go finish up his shift.

Antinous set his phone down on the dashboard and leaned his seat back. Amphinomus and Eurymachus had gone to visit some cute little antique shop they’d spotted the other day, so it was just him in the van, leaving him plenty of time to get his mind right before they all met back up at Telemachus’ house that evening.

And by ‘get his mind right’, he meant outright fantasizing about unlikely outcomes, arms crossed over his chest and eyes closed as he did.

In his scenario, it was just the three of them- himself, Peisistratus, and Telemachus. They’d all be outrageously high and giggly, and he’d have one pretty boy on each arm. Telemachus would have his head tucked against Antinous’ shoulder, lips pressed into his bicep. Peisistratus would be ranting about something, the weed loosening his tongue like the alcohol had. Maybe he’d be sharing one of his Strong Opinions on a musical.

Antinous would find some way to guide the conversation to relationships, and finally figure out Peisistratus’ stance on polyamory. Since this was his daydream, Peisistratus would be down for it, totally understanding, and chill. Then Antinous could find a way to let Peisistratus know that Telemachus was interested in actual romantic relationships, not just casual, but he was having trouble being the one to ask.

One thing would lead to another, and with a sprinkle of luck he’d get the two of them to have a mutual confession of some sort, preferably with them both in his lap. Then they’d be so thankful he’d fixed their communication issues that- nope, he needed to cut off his daydream right there, before it got too close to sex fantasy territory.

Also he was starting to feel kind of weird and guilty about trying to start something up when he was leaving town soon. Which was partly why he was focused on getting those two twink dumbasses together before he left; they’d have each other if the long distance thing didn’t work out. Antinous wasn’t the type that minded a bit of absence making the heart grow fonder, but maybe he should have considered more about how little wolf and the boy scout would feel about it.

He popped open his good eye to glance at his phone, and pulled up the calendar to see what he was working with.

After this was a week-and-a-half in Montana, then a few days in Phoenix. They’d be taking a month-long break after that, and Antinous knew his sisters would be expecting him to come home for at least some of that time. But then he’d definitely come back down here, if this worked out and he had reason to. He’d get more time next travel break, so he’d be able to spend at least three more weeks once they were done.

He entertained a three second fantasy of moving them up to Minnesota, but let it go almost immediately. Peisistratus could be talked into moving if Telemachus was, but Antinous wasn’t confident he’d be able to convince Telemachus to move anywhere, especially without his mom.

Could she be convinced? He knew trying to get his sisters to move to Arkansas was a non-starter. He barely felt safe enough to be here sometimes, and he was six-two and lifted weights. Neither of his sisters cracked five-five, and his middle sister could never stand to feel disrespected. It had gotten her in her own fair share of fights.

He was rapidly realizing that, once again, his ego had written a check that reality might not be able to cash.

Fine. It was fine. He just had to make some adjustments to The Plan.

He’d known he wanted to sleep with Telemachus the second the younger man had marched over to the van to yell at him, hopping up on the little step to make himself tall enough to glare into the window, and he’d realized the same about Peisistratus when the latter had made a point of flipping them off through the kitchen window. Peisistratus had then proceeded to flip off the van every time he passed it, either by truck or by foot, and it had been hilarious.

Antinous began to think they were already together after their hike, with how close they walked, and how Telemachus seemed to lean into Peisistratus’ side like he wanted to climb into the other boy’s lap. And by the strength and caliber of the glaring Peisistratus had been doing on the ride to and from.

Antinous had no excuse for why he then slept with Telemachus when he thought it was potentially cheating. He’d offered half as a joke, not expecting it to be accepted. Especially not after a week-and-a-half of Telemachus acting like any flirting from Antinous was horrifying. Which was maybe why he’d been a little bitchy about it at the Mexican restaurant until Telemachus read him the riot act; he was feeling angry at himself, and was taking it out on an external party because he could. It wasn’t pretty, but that had been his thought process.

But it wasn’t cheating, because those two absolute morons weren’t actually dating.

So, The Plan. Get together with them, then get them together with each other. He’d accomplished this first half somewhat, though sex itself wasn’t the end goal, but the second part was what was proving difficult. It seemed like Peisistratus was going to have to be the one to confess the mutualness of their feelings, because apparently Telemachus had the constitution of a consumptive Victorian orphan. Which, fair. Mental illness was an absolute bitch, and Antinous had the team of psychiatrists and therapists to prove it.

Okay, so there were complications. Everything worth going after had a risk involved, and he’d get those two together if he had to guide Peisistratus’ head down to make them kiss manually.

Well, no, he probably wouldn’t actually do that. The idea was a little bit hot though, if he thought about it. Maybe if he had Telemachus sat in his lap, back against Antinous’ chest, alternating between kissing Peisistratus himself and guiding them to kiss each other…

A knock at the window startled Antinous out of his fantasizing, and he almost yeeted his phone across the van.

“What?” he spat out as he rolled down the window, glaring at a snickering Amphinomus.

“We’ve been waving at you through the windshield for five minutes,” Amphinomus told him. “Unlock the door, we’re freezing our asses off out here.”

Grumbling under his breath, Antinous did so, pressing the button with a little more force than necessary. Eurymachus hopped in the back, while Amphinomus took the passenger seat.

“We found a lead for your cryptic cryptid bullshit!” Amphinomus said cheerfully, producing a business card from his sleeve with a flourish. “Saw it posted up at this adorable co-op we stopped in to grab Eury’s fancy fake cheese.”

“We wouldn’t have to if you stopped eating half my supply every fucking time,” Eurymachus grumbled.

“I like gouda, and that soy nonsense does a good job of imitating it.”

While they bickered, Antinous took the card and gave it a look.

It was simple in design, mostly white with a light purple sun embossed behind the lettering. Three lines, the final one a number to call.

Monsters? Fae? Ghosts? Need guidance?

Call Circe Persechil, and find your solution.

“Circe Persechil,” Antinous mumbled, running his thumb over the lettering. Curious, he turned the card around. There, written in neat curly handwriting, almost as an afterthought, it read ‘serious inquiries only, I swear to gods, or I feed you to the hogs.’

“Well, I say we risk it,” Antinous decided. “If she tries to murder us, we trip Eurymachus so we have time to escape.”

“Hey!” Eurymachus protested from the backseat.

“Sounds like a plan,” Amphinomus agreed, ignoring him.

That settled, Antinous dialed the number.

Chapter Text

Exactly two things matched up from Antinous’ fantasizing. Thing one: they’d partaken perhaps a bit too much of Telemachus’ stash of what he called ‘Nausicaa Special Blend’, and were all giggly and floaty from it. Thing two: Telemachus was grabby, and had decided to cling to Antinous’ arm like a lifeline.

Unfortunately, it seemed that weed did not in fact make Peisistratus more talkative, and he was sort of sprawled out on the couch, staring up at the ceiling and occasionally laughing about some unknown joke. Also unfortunately, Antinous couldn’t talk Amphinomus and Eurymachus out of being there. Eurymachus had rightly pointed out that if they planned on talking strategy, all of them should be there to do it.

They hadn’t talked much strategy though, not since they’d almost immediately raided the drawer where Telemachus kept the recreational stuff. His medical stuff was apparently kept in a second place, just in case. Antinous hadn’t asked in case of what, exactly, but he’d already known Telemachus could be fidgety about things, so he left it alone.

“So, you called the…the witchy person,” Telemachus said, blinking slowly up at Antinous. He was resting his cheek on Antinous’ shoulder. “What’d she say?”

“Well, we have an appointment to go over there tomorrow to talk to her directly. She said something about needing to look us in the eye before she decides to help us or not,” Antinous told him.

“Prolly to make sure we aren’t fuckin’ with her,” Telemachus mumbled out, eyelids heavy.

“You’re about to fall asleep,” Antinous laughed. Then, inspiration struck.

He grabbed Telemachus and stood, carting the smaller man over to the couch, where he set him on top of Peisistratus.

“If you do fall asleep, it’s probably best not to crash on the floor,” he said by way of explanation.

Telemachus made a half-asleep noise of agreement as he clamped onto Peisistratus instead. Automatically, Peisistratus wrapped an arm around him and pulled him in. The gesture was almost possessive, but there was something more tender about it. The absolute fools.

“Well, you guys have fun,” Peisistratus said behind a mouthful of Telemachus’ hair. “Unlike you lucky sons of bitches, I’ve got a day job, so I will be missing it.”

“Just call in,” Amphinomus suggested. “It won’t kill you to skip a day.” He was halfway slumped against a wall, nursing a bottle of water and slowly becoming more fascinated with the crinkling of the label.

“I got rent and shit, man. Every day I miss is eighty bucks that’s not in my paycheck.”

“What if we just gave you eighty bucks?” Eurymachus asked from his place, hanging upside down on a recliner. He was jealously guarding the last chicken sandwich they could find in the freezer, occasionally taking a tiny bite from it.

Peisistratus lifted his head to look at Eurymachus, to see if he was serious. When Eurymachus nodded to indicate that he was, in fact, serious, Peisistratus let his head fall back as he considered it. After a moment, he grabbed his phone and composed a text.

“Aright, head of housekeeping thinks I ate bad grocery store sushi and will be unavailable tomorrow,” he said, dropping the phone on the arm of the couch instead of disturbing Telemachus again just to put it in his pocket.

“Yay,” Telemachus mumbled into his collar. “More fun with you there.”

Peisistratus sighed indulgently and patted Telemachus on the shoulder, before moving to comb his fingers through Telemachus’ almost-black hair.

“Felt bad leaving you out today,” Telemachus continued, his voice small. “Sophia’s apparently a huge jerk.”

“Well, I could have told you that,” Peisistratus said.

Telemachus made some sort of grumble noise, nuzzling in closer, and Antinous sat in front of the couch to watch and wait. To see what they’d do if left to their own devices like that, while Antinous and the other two podcasters hashed out details.

Mostly it was cuddling. The kind of cuddling that could still be passed off as purely platonic, but only just. Peisistratus could probably kiss the top of Telemachus’ head just on accident, hand splayed out on his lower back where Telemachus’ shirt had ridden up just enough that the pinky on Peisistratus’ hand was touching bare skin.

Antinous could have pushed. Could have said or done something to get either of them a few more inches down the path. He decided against it. For one, Amphinomus and Eurymachus were right there, and that might get weird fast. But he also didn’t want to jeopardize the fledgling, fragile thing that was between the two. Any progress made when all parties were intoxicated would just lead to a regression once they all sobered up. Walls would slam back into place, guilt and shame would flood their minds. It would be a disaster.

What he could do, though, was to continue to watch them for a while, until his own eyelids grew heavy and they’d all long since run out of things to discuss.

“Well,” he said, slapping his knees as he worked on standing up, “we should probably get back to the RV, get some sleep. Sober up a bit,” he added, half as a joke, half because they really shouldn’t show up to this poor woman’s house high as fuck.

“Sleep well,” Peisistratus said, waving vaguely, half asleep himself.

Telemachus was fully out, arms still wrapped around Peisistratus’ waist, nose firmly planted into Peisistratus’ collar. Their legs were casually intertwined in a way that Antinous hoped wouldn’t cause either to freak out once they were actually awake in the morning.

After a moment of chewing on the inside of his cheek to make up his mind, Antinous grabbed the blanket off the top of the couch and spread it over them, getting a murmured ‘thanks’ from Peisistratus.

“Sleep tight,” Antinous told him as he finally turned to head out. In deference to Telemachus’ paranoia, and also because it was the safe thing to do, Antinous locked the door as they left.

In hindsight, they probably should have realized things were going to be weird the second they pulled up to a manor instead of a house.

It was an old place with a new coat of paint, the driveway half a mile long and completely surrounded by a tall metal fence. The place looked to operate as a small farm, with barns, stables, and a few of those long chicken coops. Behind the manor was a field that would probably be full of produce in the summertime.

“Jeez. Hope she doesn’t charge an arm and a leg,” Eurymachus said with a whistle.

The five of them were all crammed into the wolf van, Amphinomus driving while Antinous navigated from the passenger seat. The directions had led them one town over, to one of the more rural spots that was surprisingly close to the college. It was like you were in the city center, took a couple of turns, and found yourself surrounded by farmland and woods.

Amphinomus rolled down the window and pressed the button on an intercom system. After a few silent moments, it crackled to life.

“Hi? State your purpose. Please?” came a rather young-sounding voice.

“Hey, we’re just here to talk to Miss Circe Persechil,” Amphinomus said into the intercom. “We called yesterday.”

“Oh, yeah, right. Just a second, I’ll open the gate. Miss Persechil should be out in the stable building nearest to the house. I’ll tell her you’re here!” said the voice.

The gate slowly inched open, and they drove through. They parked where they could see some other cars were, and the five of them poured out of the van to head towards the stables.

Here and there they saw figures scurrying about to different buildings, all bundled up against the cold. From what Telemachus could tell, they seemed to be mostly girls, all of them around his age, some a little younger, some a little older. Also just meandering about were a few young pot-bellied pigs. You could tell they were young because they were not yet huge masses of fat and muscle. They were small enough that any of the people working could have hefted one up if it started causing trouble.

Inside the stable, it was warm. A heater was to thank for that, sitting in the only two square feet of space that wasn’t at least lightly covered in hay. Three people were in there, attending to the horses. Two of them were younger, though they all moved about the space with a practiced ease.

The third figure, a woman in her late thirties or early forties, finished removing the saddle from a beautiful mahogany horse. Telemachus had no idea what kind it was, or anything about it except that it was obviously well cared for. Even if its mane was a little tangled and bogged down with grass and hay.

“You’re early for your appointment,” the woman told them, hanging the saddle up before turning to one of the younger women. “Please get Thursday finished up for me.”

“Yes ma’am!” the girl said cheerfully, grabbing up a brush and setting about detangling the windswept mess of the horse’s tail.

The woman patted her on the shoulder in thanks, then fully turned to their group.

She was tall, probably only a couple of inches shorter than Antinous, and had the kind of posture one expected from the military. Her light-brown hair was pulled into a low braid and tucked into her scarf, a few strands having come loose during the ride she’d apparently just finished. Her face was free of makeup, except for on her mouth, which was a slash of blood-red.

Circe, Telemachus assumed.

“I see you brought the entire menagerie,” she said, not quite reproachful yet, but something teetering towards it.

“This is everyone who was there that night,” Antinous told her. “We figured having all of the witnesses might help.”

“It might,” she conceded with a nod. “Well, follow me. We may as well have this conversation somewhere a bit more comfortable.”

With that, she led them off towards the house.

They followed her like a pack of ducklings as she pulled out a carabiner key ring with approximately twenty or so keys on it, and grabbed the correct one on the first try. Once they were all inside and the door shut once again, she tapped a code into the security system to re-arm it.

In a second she had her coat and scarf off, flung to the side to land on a coat rack set up for exactly that purpose, and smoothed the braid with her other hand. With a couple of sweeps it went from ‘wild run through the forest’ to merely ‘artfully windswept’.

She looked less like an equestrian, and more like someone’s witchy aunt. Which, Telemachus supposed, she sort of was, in her violet sweater with long sleeves that widened at the bottom, and tailored khakis tucked into leather boots. Her neck and fingers were loaded with jewelry, chunks of raw crystals elegantly wrapped into rings or pendants.

“Echo, can you set up a tray for six?” Circe called.

A girl they hadn’t really noticed standing in the doorway to the kitchen gave a cheery little salute.

“Right away Miss Persechil,” she said, a little quietly, but with a bright smile.

“Stick with the rose and Arabica tea blend,” Circe added. “Thank you.”

“Can do, will do,” Echo said as she turned and skittered back into the kitchen.

“Smart girl, just needs to speak up sometimes,” Circe mumbled, mostly to herself. To the podcasters and their two add-ons, she said, “I’ve got us set up in the library. We can talk there in relative peace.”

The library was a largeish room with one wall made of nothing but windows, speckled with a large number of couches, and several bookcases holding what looked like hand-me-down textbooks. And one that was full of old romance novels, the kind with the vaguely horny oil paintings as the cover art. It was quiet, but Telemachus could still faintly hear music someone was playing in a different room. Something punk-screamo adjacent with a female vocalist full of rage.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see that Amphinomus was mouthing the words to whatever the song was.

“Now, tell me about the event from the top,” Circe Persechil said, flopping down into an overstuffed armchair. “You first.” She pointed at Antinous with one perfectly manicured finger.

Possibly acrylics, considering how long they were, but Telemachus had seen natural nails that long too. Circe seemed the type to have a proprietary nail oil applied nightly to promote health and strength. His mom did that, said it helped prevent snags when she worked on her knitting or quilting. Telemachus was way too lazy, but he could see the appeal.

Antinous gave his account of the night in question. It was distressingly exact, perfectly in line with Telemachus’ own memories. The biggest difference, of course, being that Antinous had been able to break from his sleep paralysis almost as soon as he'd discovered it. He’d bitten his own cheek, and the pain had snapped him out.

As he talked, Antinous kept bringing his hand up to his eye, pressing lightly against the closed lid that protected the eye prosthetic. He’d been wearing his usual one that day, the one that almost completely matched his good eye. Telemachus had almost felt a bit disappointed; he’d glimpsed Antinous’ collection of eyes while they’d been getting their stuff ready that morning at the campsite. He had quite a few really cool looking ones.

After he was done, Circe wanted to hear Peisistratus’ version. Halfway through this, Echo swept into the room with a push cart of mugs of tea, little carafes for cream and sugar, and a plate of m&m cookies.

For reasons that Telemachus wasn’t sure of himself- maybe his paranoia acting up a bit, maybe because he’d been reading that fae encyclopedia too much- he waited until Circe had taken a bite of cookie before he grabbed one for himself.

The tea itself was herbal and warming, with a faint peppery taste that wasn’t quite spicy or anything, but reminded him of jalapeños. It was also gently floral, but without the strange soapy taste that roses could sometimes get if you got them too hot.

With the opening of the door, the music strained through a little clearer, Amphinomus bobbing his head.

Circe paused, angling one ear to hear the music better, before she sighed deeply.

“Echo, when you get the chance, go annoy Laurel. She’s listening to the song she plays when she sneaks someone in here and doesn’t want us to hear anything. Make sure she’s at least being responsible.”

“Bimbocore is a pretty sexy album,” Amphinomus muttered under his breath.

Telemachus had to stomp his own foot to keep from laughing, worried Circe would see it as disrespectful. Instead, he shoved the rest of his cookie in his mouth as a distraction.

“So, what is this place, some work-study program for the university? Teaching young girls how to run a farm?” Antinous asked, finishing off his mug of tea.

“Something like that,” Circe said. “I take in those that have aged out of the foster system, house them, find them job training, and help them file for scholarships and grants. Working here gets them credit for the community college too, in case they just want an associates degree, or if they go into the agriculture program at the university.”

“Surprised the powers that be don’t make a fuss about your witch stuff, then,” Antinous noted.

“Oh, I hide the pentagrams when they come by for inspections,” Circe said with a dismissive wave. “Echo, my assistant, is the only one who really knows about the magic side of things. The rest of the kids think I’m just a little new-age. Now, Peisistratus, you were saying about grabbing your gun?”

Peisistratus nodded somewhat nervously, before continuing his recap of the events.

“Uh, yeah. I kept it at the foot of the air mattress, safety on, just in case. You can never be too careful when camping,” he said. He was methodically picking at his cuticles, probably about to make himself bleed if he continued.

Telemachus tapped his knee up against Peisistratus’, distracting the latter a bit from his anxious habit. Getting the hint, Peisistratus dropped his hands with a soft, chagrined smile.

After he was done it was Telemachus’ turn, then Amphinomus and Eurymachus gave their rundown of the aftermath, as the two who hadn’t seen or heard the whatever-it-was, but had seen how freaked out the ones who had were.

When everyone had given their statements, Circe leaned back, violet thumb nail tapping at scarlet lip, and let out a breath.

“There’s quite a few things it could be,” she said. “Though I do put more stock in it being some variety of fae or spirit. Perhaps even a thoughtform, built up by years of superstition. I’ll consult what I can, see how dangerous it really is. Anyway, should I dec—”

The door opened again, and two girls clattered inside, faces made up and wearing clothes that were not meant for February but were very sparkly. They were both very tall, one blonde, one brunette.

“Hey, Daphne and I are meeting up with Cynth in a little bit, gonna check out that club, Glycerin. Is there a specific curfew you want me back by?” the blonde asked. She seemed a little nervous and fidgety, but was putting up a valiant effort at trying to look more poised.

Circe rolled her eyes, but the side of her mouth twitched up in a small grin. “Just as long as you’re back in enough time to rest before your shift with the cows tomorrow,” she told the girl.

The name of the club sounded familiar, and Telemachus was twisting it around in his head, trying to think of when he’d last heard about it. Glycerin…was a gay club in this town, that much he knew, even if he was too young to have gone, and not brave enough to have gotten a fake ID. But there was something…

Uh oh. He had a duty of care to warn them.

“Hey, you might want to go to Majesty’s instead,” Telemachus spoke up. “The owner of Glycerin is a real creep. A friend of mine from PFLAG got her drink spiked there, and the owner didn’t do shit cuz the perp was his friend. Majesty’s has better security anyway.”

Majesty’s had also held a memorial for his grandmother a few years back, and the bartender was super nice and gave him free Shirley Temples the entire time. But that was personal bias, not a safety thing.

“Looks like they have better reviews, too,” the brunette, Daphne, noted, looking down at her phone. “I can just text Cynth to meet us there instead?”

Circe and the blonde girl were both giving Telemachus appraising looks, as if deciding whether his advice was genuine or not. After a second, the blonde nodded, looking back to her friend.

“Yeah, sure,” she said. “Text him. His twink ass would probably be in more danger than either of us anyway.”

“Laurel!” Daphne fake-admonished, swatting the other girl on the shoulder. “Can you even be a twink if you're bi? I thought that was a gay exclusive term.”

“Bi still counts,” Telemachus and Peisistratus answered at the same time. Peisistratus was pointing at Telemachus.

Behind Telemachus’ back, unbeknownst to him, Antinous was also pointing at him.

“Thanks for looking out,” Daphne said, giving him half a wink before she turned to leave, dragging Laurel with her.

Almost as soon as they left, Echo came back in to grab the cart of dishes.

“So she did sneak her girlfriend in?” Circe asked.

“They were just doing their makeup, nothing that required a lecture this time,” Echo said. “Also I’m not sure they’ve progressed to the ‘girlfriend’ label. They’re still dancing around the subject.”

“Kids,” Circe sighed. “I don’t understand this generation’s aversion to commitment. Thank you, Echo.”

Telemachus said nothing, because he resembled that remark and he damn well knew it. He’d had exactly one person he’d actually used the term ‘boyfriend’ for, and it had fallen apart so fast he wasn’t sure if his mother or Peisistratus had even known about it.

“Alright,” Circe began, sitting forward in her chair. “I will help you. I’ll find out what this entity is, and excise it if it means harm. I ask a nominal fee, and that you three,” she pointed at the podcasters, “do not record me in any way. I am not going to risk the state taking away my kiddos just because of foolish religious sensibilities. Got it?”

“Got it,” the three of them agreed.

“Fabulous,” she said cheerfully, clapping her hands together. “I’ll send you a text once I’ve figured out what we’re dealing with. I’ll walk you out.”

“So she was mildly terrifying,” Telemachus said a few minutes after they’d left the manor behind. They’d all been practically silent up until then.

There was a general murmur of agreement throughout the van.

“I’m just glad she actually agreed to help us,” said Amphinomus, tapping at the steering wheel. Probably to the tune of one of the songs that had been playing while they were there. “I thought for a minute she was gonna leave our collective ass out to dry.”

There was a second general murmur of agreement.

“You know, I didn’t expect a town in Arkansas to have more than one gay club,” Antinous noted.

“It’s a college town,” Telemachus shrugged. “And this is one of the more metropolitan areas in the state. I mean, we’re still waist-deep in religious extremists and other assorted douchebags, but there’s a pretty thriving queer scene that spans this town, mine, and the two next to it. Majesty’s wasn’t even started as a gay club, technically. Just a lot of the gay community started going there, so they adapted their business model.”

“Unfortunately, being comprised of humans, the queer scene also has its fair share of douchebags,” Peisistratus said grumpily. “The places that tout themselves as the most inclusive and welcoming tend to be super toxic. Hence why the official gay club is full of creeps, but the unofficial one is less so.”

“And why I stopped going to PFLAG so much. I mean, in addition to Sophia being The Worst,” Telemachus said.

“And I only still go because Leander and Hiro bring too many baked goods, and they let me take as many home as I want,” Peisistratus said.

“Then Nausicaa and I steal them from Peisistratus,” Telemachus added.

“Thief,” Peisistratus joked, pretending to elbow Telemachus in the side.

“You’ve just gotta learn to eat them faster,” Telemachus said with an unrepentant grin.

Antinous was watching them via the rear-view mirror, an unreadable expression on his face. Telemachus caught his eye and stuck a tongue out at him, earning a snort of laughter.

“So, this does mean we’re going to have to stick around for a little longer than we’d planned,” Amphinomus pointed out.

“Good, I didn’t want to go to Montana anyway,” Antinous said. “I almost got eaten by a bear last time we were up there.”

“You did not,” Eurymachus scoffed. “Dumbass over there was taking pictures of one while we were in Yellowstone a year or so back, but his viewfinder was messed up, and he has terrible depth perception. The bear was only like twenty feet away from him by the time Amphi grabbed him by the collar and dragged him into the RV. The bear was perfectly docile though, just seemed curious.”

“The other tourists taking photos had already sped off,” Amphinomus added.

Telemachus cackled at the image, and at the glares that Antinous shot everyone else.

“Least I got great pictures, though,” Antinous mumbled icily.

Peisistratus nudged the back of Antinous’ seat with his foot, saying, “Show me those when we get back to Tele’s house. When my family went up there a few years back, we saw zero bears. We got an album full of buffalo pictures, but no bears.”

And when they got back, Antinous dug out his album, and Peisistratus and Telemachus crowded around his shoulders to look at the bear for way longer than probably necessary.

Chapter Text

—Something wrong with the fuel gage and the nav system, I can’t—

Click.

—My copilot is down, I repeat, my copilot is down—

Click.

—Going to try and land, but it’s gonna be trouble—

Click.

—You even receiving these messages?

Click.

Odysseus let the tape recorder drop from his hand onto his chest. He couldn’t find the grip strength to keep hold of it, and he didn’t care enough to try and drop it somewhere else.

His ankle was chained to the coffee table, as it often was when Calypso got into the beat-up old truck to drive the twenty miles to the nearest town. She went there to sell jams and pickles, and didn’t want him getting out while she was gone. It was how she afforded the fuel for the generator keeping this cabin off the grid, how she got the gas for her truck.

Odysseus pulled himself up, into a sitting position, testing the strength of his leg before he got up to shuffle to the fridge, links of the chain clinking in his wake. It wasn’t so bad; the break was mostly healed now, and she wouldn’t break it again if he didn’t try to run. Which, to be honest, he couldn’t really do anyway. Not when it was this cold, this far from civilization. Waiting for the warmer months meant giving his leg more time to grow stronger again.

There was pickled okra and beets in the fridge, as well as the remnants of a block of cheese. He found the bread Calypso had baked just the day before, and made himself something like a sandwich. He’d let himself forget to eat long enough that it was more like a mangled mess, his hands trembling too much to hold the knife steady, but it still tasted alright.

When she got back, he was going to ask her if he could visit the graves again. He was in one of those moods where he really missed his brother-in-law, and sometimes it helped just to sit at the grave for a while and not think about much. He was never that superstitious, didn’t really attend church, but he believed in the soul. He hoped Eurylochus’ soul was resting, calm now.

He ate, and then laid back down, mostly under the coffee table, like a skittish cat. He hated feeling exposed, even more so these days. He just needed the comfort of cover, where he couldn’t be seen from the front door, where he had to be convinced out.

He grabbed the tape recorder, rewinding it again, and played it. Over and over.

It always started so hopeful, him and Eurylochus making jokes over the radio, then getting quieter as the storm rolled in above them. Then there was the frenetic energy of trying to stay on course, trying to fly straight, until it was useless and they had no idea where they were anymore. The nav system had gone wonky with all of the sound and shaking.

And that was before they’d been struck by lightning.

Technically it hit Eurylochus’ seat, and if they were any kind of lucky it had been instant, because Odysseus didn’t want to think about him possibly living even a minute like that, body burning from the inside. Odysseus was mostly unharmed, but he couldn’t say the same for the rest of the plane. Radio was hanging on by a thread, but he could barely transmit. Nav system was shuttered and dark, utterly useless now. Then he’d noticed the rapidly emptying fuel gage, and knew he’d need to make an emergency landing soon, and fingers crossed that it wouldn’t kill him in the attempt.

It hadn’t, but his plane was mangled and his leg wasn’t bearing his weight, so the situation still wasn’t good. But, he was alive, and that’s what counted.

He dreaded having to tell his sister about her husband, about his death. But he’d felt like he’d done right by her, staying with the body until the storm had abated, holding Eurylochus’ hand even as it cooled and grew stiff. His own private vigil for one of his best friends, observed without the pomp and ceremony of a funeral; it was a balm, in a way. Those fancy funerals were exactly the kind of thing Eurylochus always hated to attend.

“Light me on a pyre,” he’d joked many times, if only to hear Odysseus groan and complain about what kind of permits that would need, not to mention the smell.

“Well, then just serve barbecue,” he’d tack on to that, and Odysseus would groan again.

“You’re going to have to make sure your wife knows,” Odysseus would snap without any real heat, “because the way things are going, you’re going to be the death of me. So, I’ll have gone first.”

He should have known Eurylochus was gonna be big enough of a bastard to make him eat his words, but he’d hoped that would wait. That they’d be old men by then, with canes they used to smack each other in the shins on their way to bingo. That he and Eurylochus and Penelope and Ctimene would all be in the same old-folks home together, visited by the gaggle of kids they’d always planned to have.

Sometimes, in the depth of his worst moments, he would dream of getting to grow very old. Penelope would be by his side, of course, age only heightening how beautiful she was. No amount of wrinkles or spots or gray hairs could tarnish her beauty; her razor wit and kind heart would shine through her eyes and she’d be just as lovely as that first night. And Telemachus would be there, his sweet boy. He’d have a life of his own, of course, his own goals and ambitions, but Odysseus could only hope he'd carve out time for his aging parents. To come to the house for lemonade and sweet tea, to bake with Penelope and grill with Odysseus.

Maybe one day his boy would have a family of his own, or maybe he didn’t want one like that. Those details would change dream-to-dream. Sometimes he imagined Telemachus with a wife or husband and a chorus of kids. Sometimes not. But always his sweet, smiling boy, grown and changed but still the same core as he’d always been. With his mother’s face but Odysseus’ tenacity.

He dreamed of their reunion. Woke up floating in that warm place before his reality crashed back down on him. Muddled through another day, dodging Calypso’s stilted attempts to seduce him. It wasn’t hard; she could put up a mask of normalcy for a little while, trying to act her age, but then she’d crash into some internal wall and regress back into her child-state, words sing-song and eyes wide.

Odysseus didn’t want to, but he pitied her. Felt sorry for her. It was easy to do in her child-state, when she was harmless and nervous. Yes, she’d kept him here for who knows how long, and she didn’t seem that broken up about it, but it was almost like she didn’t understand why what she did was wrong. No one had ever really taught her, and everyone that could have was buried in the little graveyard next to the house.

When she’d first brought him there, before he knew he wasn’t going to be let go again, she’d gone back for the body when he’d asked. The weather had been so dry that they hadn’t wanted to risk a fire, so she’d agreed to bury Eurylochus there too. Odysseus had done his best to make a little headstone for him, carving out wobbly letters into a big enough rock to mark the space where Eurylochus’ head would be. Enough so that, when rescue came, he could find the body again and have it exhumed. Brought back home with him.

Seven years on, and Odysseus didn’t know how much of his friend would be left to bring home. If he ever got to bring Eurylochus home.

The girl had been a lanky, half-starved teen at the time. Now she was technically an adult, who got better at hunting game and farming her little plot to feed them both, and to sell what was left for what she couldn’t make herself, or Odysseus couldn’t make for her.

“Why are you out here all alone?” he’d asked once, towards the beginning, when he just thought she was just waiting until his leg was better to take him into town, to get him back home. He’d had a mind to bring her with- Penelope wouldn’t mind a daughter, he’d figured. They’d talked about having more children plenty enough.

“Gov’ment killed ‘em all,” she’d said, somewhat gruffly, accent thicker than Odysseus’ had ever been. “Came here one day, all yellin’ about something I didn’t hear real good, cuz I was in the cabinet under the sink. Shot every last one of my family. Didn’t even collect the bodies, just let ‘em stay to rot. I had to bury them myself.”

In drips, the whole story had eventually been coaxed out of her. Her dad had been a fire-and-brimstone kind of preacher, made his family into his own little cult of personality until they were barely worshipping a god anymore. She didn’t know what got the government interested, didn’t know what made them decide that summary execution was the correct course of action- if that had been really what happened, she was only twelve or thirteen when they died. Seventeen when Odysseus practically landed in her backyard.

Sometimes they would share a bed, or Calypso would bring a blanket and lay beside him on the floor. At the start, he’d thought it was a lonely thing, a child wanting connection, so he’d let her. It wasn’t that different from when his son had gotten scared and came to snuggle down between him and Penelope, needing the simple comfort of a parent.

When she called him daddy and placed her hand on his thigh, he’d realized that something was very wrong. She was so confused when he pushed her hand away, when he’d told her just to sleep. She didn’t understand why he turned her down, kept turning her down.

She’d gotten it in her head that he was sent there to help her rebuild the church, and didn’t get why he was so resistant to it. Bringing up his wife, his Penelope, only brought on recitations of passages from the Bible that condoned polygamy from Calypso. Bringing up her age just confused her. She was child and woman, scared and captor, deceptively strong under blonde curls and large dark brown eyes, and Odysseus didn’t know how to fix the situation in a way he felt good about.

He could have killed her a dozen times, and he’d thought about it a lot, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. She was too young, reminded him too much of the family he had waiting for him back home. Besides, he was done with killing. He’d left the military, retired when he could barely stand the visage of the man who stared back at him from the mirror. Sometimes he still washed his hands until they were raw, as if there could be a speck of blood still hiding under his nails.

They’d taken to calling it the Leda Incident. Helen Leda had gone missing, taken while she'd been waiting for her next transmission to come through, to send it ahead so they’d know where to position troops. But that call went unanswered, and her directions never came.

Technically, Odysseus wasn’t supposed to be getting his own boots dirty anymore- he was just supposed to tell people things from behind a desk. But he’d promised Menelaus, her husband, that he’d do anything to bring her back. So, he’d kept his word. He’d pulled on his old fatigues and boots and went to find her. The higher ups hadn’t liked it, not one bit. He’d have been asked to retire afterwards regardless.

They’d succeeded in their original goal. They’d found Helen and got her out safely. But, as they tried to find their way back to base, they’d walked right into an ambush. Faulty intel from the communication liaison, the kind of thing that just happened from time to time, and Odysseus had lost one of his best friends and several good men. He’d had to do a lot of things he wasn’t proud of to get out, to get the rest of his team out.

After he got back to base, after all of the debriefing, even after he’d officially retired, they kept dragging him back to conferences and meetings, all ‘and here’s former Brigadier General Laerson, let’s keep making him talk about it like he doesn’t have any feelings, like it’s not tearing his soul to pieces to be apart from his wife and kid for this stupid dog and pony show’. He hated it. He’d planned on making the last conference in DC his actual last conference, maybe going into construction or buying a plot of land for a small farm or something. Then, lightning, dead brother-in-law, broken leg, locked away for seven fucking years.

With a rare burst of energy, he shoved himself out from under the table and grabbed at the chain, pulling and twisting at it in a rage, even as he knew it wasn’t going to do anything. He was strong, but he’d spent enough time pulling at that very same chain to know that he couldn’t pull metal apart. Even then, he twisted it and pulled, arms shaking with rage.

He threw the chain back onto the ground and instead grabbed the leg of the table. That he could break, and he eventually did, sending the entire table over and spilling off all of the cups and trash and various odds and ends. He tossed the leg as hard as he could at the window, sending spider web cracks along the surface, but not smashing it entirely.

Then, he sat there, amidst the destruction. He sat until he heard the familiar sound of a truck’s engine pulling up to the house, until he saw the familiar girl getting out of it.

She stared at him once she was back inside, eyes flicking to the table, the detritus, the window, then back to him.

“I would appreciate,” he said in a voice that was much calmer than he felt, “If we stopped with the whole ankle-chaining thing.”

Peisistratus laid in the back of the van, getting his breathing back to baseline. He was laying on a pile of blankets and pillows that had been purloined from the RV's storage. Antinous was throwing away a handful of wipes he’d used to clean them up, and double checked his zipper to make sure he’d actually zipped it up.

They could have hurried to get back in place, to make it look like they hadn’t been up to what they’d been up to, but Peisistratus was so tired of hurried trysts. Tired of it feeling halfway shameful at the end, like he was doing something wrong when he knew he wasn’t. So. He laid there, attuned to his own heartbeat as it slowed down.

Telemachus and the other two podcasters had gone to take the fae encyclopedia back- he’d taken notes and finished it already- and to pick up some dinner for them all. Peisistratus and Antinous hadn’t really wanted to go, so they’d stayed behind. One thing led to another, as sometimes happened.

“Thank you for being so polite about that,” Peisistratus told Antinous, turning onto his side to watch the other man as he pawed through a bag of granola bars, assumedly looking for a particular flavor.

“Hmm?” Antinous said, half distracted as he scrutinized labels.

“About not wanting to have, like, sex. Lot of guys get mad if I don’t.”

“Personally, I think oral counts, but if you need to find some religious loophole or whatever, don’t let me stop you,” Antinous told him, though there was something in his posture. A ‘thinking about the other implications of what Peisistratus just said’ sort of rigidness.

Peisistratus looked at him like he wanted to roll his eyes. “Fine. I didn’t want anal sex. There. Specific. Anyways, it’s not a religious thing, it’s just that blow jobs don’t feel like sex to me. Sexual, yes absolutely. I think I just associate it with being a dumb teen with my first boyfriend. Neither of us was out, so getting lube was a no-go. Hence, oral, because apparently just using hands wasn’t enough for him.” At the memory, Peisistratus did roll his eyes.

Antinous had located the flavor he wanted, and handed the bag to Peisistratus.

“Pushy?” Antinous guessed.

“The pushiest,” Peisistratus confirmed, snagging a peanut-butter and chocolate chip bar.

Antinous chewed at his bottom lip, considering something. Peisistratus left him to figure it out, and just chewed the granola bar, looking out the window. It was snowing again.

“Aside from that guy, did anyone else ever get ‘pushy’?” Antinous eventually asked.

“Hm. A couple did, maybe? I got better at telling them to fuck off if they didn’t stop pushing, though. Just the first guy that managed to badger me into it.” Peisistratus paused to make a face. “Thought I was gonna marry him at the time. See, that was the religious loophole. Not a sin if you’re planning on marrying the person you’re with.”

“Are you religious? That was more a joke about southern sensibilities,” Antinous said, but he had his eyebrows pushed together like he was thinking something else.

“I was, back then. I’ve had two or three crises of faith in the intervening six years. Spent a couple of those in my ‘slut era’, so I kind of had to get over a few religious scruples.”

“You’re not still in it?” Antinous joked, dodging when Peisistratus threw a pillow at him.

“Fuck off,” Peisistratus said pleasantly. “But no, I stopped. The whole thing wasn’t as fun as I’d thought it would be, and I wasn’t feeling very fulfilled. I believe I mentioned that casual isn’t my preference.”

“Honestly, it’s not mine either,” Antinous admitted. “It’s just kind of difficult to do relationships when I’m traveling so much. Not many people are willing to wait for however long for me to show back up. You get cheated on once, and it sort of makes you hella paranoid after that.”

“Ouch. Sorry that happened to you,” Peisistratus told him, gently bonking Antinous’ shoulder with his fist.

“Sorry you had a shitty first boyfriend,” Antinous said, returning the gesture but harder, sending Peisistratus tipping to the side for a second.

“Honestly, this is going to sound really sad, I don’t think I’ve had boyfriends who weren’t assholes. Not that I’ve had that many. I just have terrible taste in guys.”

The ‘except for Telemachus’ was left unsaid, but Peisistratus was pretty sure Antinous still heard it in the spaces between his words. After a second, he saw Antinous come to a decision.

“They get any better after rapey douchefuck at least?” Antinous asked cautiously.

It was Peisistratus ‘ eyebrows’ turn to knit together. “I mean, I don’t know if I’d classify him as rapey,” he eventually said.

“You wouldn’t?” Antinous asked.

“I mean, he was just persistent. Pushy, like you said before.”

Antinous flopped onto his back on the blankets, resting his hands on his stomach, clasped together. He was thinking, so Peisistratus stayed quiet and let him.

After a while, Antinous came to another decision.

“I mentioned I was not a great person when I was seventeen, right?” he asked.

“To be fair, I was not either. I don’t think most seventeen year olds are good people,” Peisistratus said.

Antinous laughed a little at that. “I can betcha I was worse. I was already pretty violent as a kid; I felt like people acted like I was stupid, and I wasn’t, so I’d try to prove I wasn’t with my fists. Or whatever happened to be nearby at the time.

“When I got to seventeen, it got worse. Harder to contain. I would go red and come back to disciplinary action and threats of calling the cops. But, in the end, I always was defending myself, and no one wants to testify that they thought it was a good idea to call the six-foot-two guy a fag, so it would get dropped. Then I put another guy’s hand into a stamp press. Thankfully, I snapped back to myself in time to pull it back out before it got crushed, and realized I needed help before I actually got arrested. My parents hated each other, but they loved me, so I actually got that help. They teamed up to make sure I took my meds and went to therapy.”

Antinous took a long, slow breath, giving Peisistratus a chance to really comprehend the words, before he continued.

“All of this is to say, if someone I dated said what you said about your ex about me, my parents would have driven me to the jail themselves. I’ve been filled with violence and lust, and the various permutations thereof, but my parents made sure I knew what no meant. That I knew the difference between needing reassurance and a denial. Like, when we were on the hike. You were unsure because of the location, so I said something soothing and let you decide if you wanted to or not, and double checked that you were sure when you agreed.”

The two of them were silent for a long time, laying down side by side, curled towards each other just a little bit.

“…The thing is,” Peisistratus said after this long time, in a small, tiny little voice, “it doesn’t make sense why my reactions are what they are. I know I have trouble sometimes with sex, but it’s never really been directed at what Andros and I did, at oral. I mean, I like it, it was just…”

Ten ways of ending that sentence all fought for precedence in the back of his throat. It was just using my mouth, it was just me on my knees, it was just that neither of us knew what we were doing. None of them felt adequate. Not when he thought about it. Not when he remembered the way he’d felt after, that first time. Almost throwing up in his ex’s bathroom but not knowing why, rehearsing ways to say that they couldn’t do that again please, not ever. Deciding not to say it, letting himself be convinced again a few weeks later, because he figured out he had something of an oral fixation that popped up every now and then.

“I like giving them, is the thing. Wouldn’t I hate it? I said it was okay,” Peisistratus said, and he hated the way his voice sounded so helpless. “Eventually,” he added, because the word was kicking and screaming at him. Begging to be added.

Eventually. After Andros asked for the seventh time in an hour and moved so he was blocking the door.

“I don’t know. Brains do weird shit all the time,” Antinous told him. “It’s like the therapy technique, where you reenact certain events in controlled ways. A lot people write about it. A lot of people do kinky roleplay about it.”

Despite himself, Peisistratus laughed.

“You ever do that kind of therapy technique?” he asked. Even with the heavy subject matter, he found himself inching close enough to rest his head on Antinous’ shoulder. Antinous was just so warm, and it calmed Peisistratus down to focus on the warmth and his own breathing.

“Yeah. I had to do something with all that anger. Pills don’t numb it out like that, not if they’re working right, they just make it more manageable. So it’s got to be channeled into something productive, instead of destructive. It’s half the reason I actually work out, even when it gets a little hard with all of the travel. I did track in high-school, that helped too.”

After a minute, Antinous added, “So what made you so bad as a teen, huh? Any worse than me?”

He said it like a joke, and it was, because he was right that Peisistratus hadn’t been a violent teen, aside from once when one of the idiots on the wrestling team had said something rude and cruel to Telemachus. Peisistratus had snapped, just that once, and broken the guy’s nose. That was when he got suspended for the first time.

“Blew a bunch of the basketball team to get back at my ex when we broke up,” Peisistratus admitted. “Convinced the rest to pretend we did by doing their homework for a week, almost got caught doing that. Did a lot of vandalism, definitely got caught a couple of times. Tried to pick up a smoking habit, but thankfully it didn’t stick.” Though, sometimes, when he was very tired or very angry, he still wished he had a pack in his pocket. They made him feel awful, though, so he always managed to talk himself out of it.

“What kind of vandalism?” Antinous asked, which was not the part that Peisistratus had expected him to latch onto.

“Mostly pentagrams and edgy weirdness spray-painted onto the outside walls. ‘Devil was here’, intentionally misspelled, quotes from ‘My Immortal’ that I thought were especially funny.”

“The fanfic or the song?”

“Fanfic.”

“So, did you used to be goth, or were you just doing it for the bit?” Antinous asked.

“Oh, I’m still goth at heart, I’m just too lazy to actually dress up ever, and they don’t make flannel shirts in suitably goth colors. Not unless I wanna pay forty bucks per shirt. It, like emo and punk, is more about the music than the aesthetic anyway.”

“You’d look really cute all dressed up, though. Send me a picture if you ever feel up to it,” Antinous said, running a hand through Peisistratus’  hair.

“Maybe,” Peisistratus managed, leaning into the touch.

Peisistratus almost wanted to ask him to stop that, because this entire situation had veered radically away from casual, but it had been a while since someone had pet him like that, had curled an arm around him like that, and he wanted it more than he wanted to preserve his stupid fragile heart. He wanted Antinous to keep saying these things to him, pointing things out to him, even if it hurt. Even if he knew he was going to crash out about these realizations later.

He was going to have to tell Telemachus, he realized. Telemachus who’d always hated Andros, always had a snide comment to say under his breath. Thankfully, Telemachus wasn’t an ‘I told you so’ type of person, at least not about something like…well, like what Peisistratus was rapidly realizing was even shittier of a relationship than he’d previously thought.

When they’d woken up that morning, and after Peisistratus quickly extricated his hand from where it had made its way under Telemachus’ shirt before the latter noticed, Peisistratus had finally finagled the whole story out of Telemachus, about Sophia and the additional ways in which she sucked that he’d learned from Neo. Peisistratus hated being right, hated the ways Tele had been lied to and manipulated. It had left the both of them feeling quite small. This was more of the same, really, just that Peisistratus possibly had to talk to cops about his shitty relationship.

Peisistratus grabbed his phone and googled the statute of limitations for sexual assault. It turned out to be five years without physical evidence, which he did not have. The event in question had happened six years ago. He wasn’t sure if he was more angry, or more relieved. Angry because he felt a sense of guilt for not realizing it in time, and a sense of worry that Andros hadn’t learned to be a better person in the interim, and might hurt someone else. And he was relieved because he didn’t want to go talk to the police, get questioned, get judged. He didn’t want to sit in a court room and get called a liar. He could process this in his own time.

He was going to have to work tomorrow. That was a thing that kept happening. He’d get fucked over emotionally, and have to show up at his shitty job regardless. It would be fine, he just had to download enough interesting YouTube videos that he wouldn’t have to think too hard about things. When he died, hopefully in many, many decades, he was going to have words with whatever greater being had decided capitalism was the right way to go about things.

“God dammit,” Antinous mumbled to himself.

“Huh?” Peisistratus asked, looking up at him.

“Oh, nothing, my brain is just being an asshole to me again.”

Peisistratus nodded, because mood and same. His brain could be incredibly mean to him, too.

“I think they’re almost back with the pizza,” Antinous added after a moment, looking at his phone. He showed it to Peisistratus, where he was tracking Eurymachus and Amphinomus’ phones. “We should probably be waiting in the actual house when they get here.”

So, with a slightly disappointed sigh, they repacked the pillows and blankets, and went to wait for the others.

Antinous was fuming on the inside, because he’d planned to use the post-coitus time to try and bring up polyamory and get Peisistratus’ thoughts on it, but things had derailed rapidly. He never wanted to be the guy who had to break the news to someone that they’d been raped, but he couldn’t keep his mouth shut when he was seeing all the ways in which Peisistratus was still obviously affected without knowing what or why. Now he wanted to rage at the world, at himself, at that Andros motherfucker who needed an aluminum baseball bat to the shins and also dick.

One of these days, things were going to go his way, and his plans would fall neatly into place, and he’d skip off into the sunset with two cute boyfriends, but apparently, that day was not today.

Chapter Text

Telemachus could remember the day he realized he was in love with his best friend. It was shortly after he’d turned ten, in those few weeks before Peisistratus officially turned eleven, and they were in the woods by Telemachus’ childhood home. The one they moved out of shortly before he turned twelve. The little wooded area was part of a park, so they were never very far from the rest of civilization, but to them it felt like being in the untamed wild. Their assorted parents were nearby, but letting the two children have a breath of independence, to learn how to be careful on their own for a few minutes.

Peisistratus heard the waterfall first, voice trailing off as he strained up on his tiptoes to better catch the sound, auburn hair fire red in the sunlight. Then he grabbed Telemachus’ arm and tugged him towards rushing water and red clay, where a recent rain had swelled the stream into breaking its usual bounds.

The two boys rolled up the cuffs of their pants and marched into the chilly water, shoes kicked off by the bank. They splashed around, getting covered in silt and muck, collecting pretty rocks and shells until they didn’t have any more room in their pockets. In fact, Telemachus had to give half his haul to Peisistratus to carry, because this was still when he wore girl’s clothes, and the pockets were tragic in their tinyness. When they were done with that, they washed their hands in the rushing waterfall that fed the stream, making them smell like rocks and fish.

Telemachus was in front, trying to tiptoe to avoid his feet coming into contact with too much gravel. He’d been a bit of a wimp when it came to pain back then, the kind of squirmy distaste for it that came with not having yet experienced anything really painful. His attempts only unbalanced him, and his ankles were never very good anyway, so he began to tilt to the side, windmilling his arms to try and right himself again, when he felt Peisistratus grab him, hands just under his armpits, and get him righted again.

“You okay?” Peisistratus asked, instead of snapping ‘you’re such a pain!’ or ‘you’re so clumsy!’ like some of the girls and boys at school did.

Telemachus could only nod, thinking how he’d never noticed just how pretty Peisistratus’ wavy hair was as it curled around his ears. Thinking how warm his hands had been, steadying Telemachus onto his feet.

Peisistratus gave him a wide grin, a toothy one that showed where the last of his baby teeth had just fallen out, and where the adult set was growing in the space. It was an unashamed grin, one that didn’t care that he had gaps in his teeth, or that several of them were kinda crooked, and Telemachus thought that was just about the coolest thing he could think of.

There was a double-barreled rush into his stomach, two separate but very near emotions that took him a while to untangle. The first was crush, that instant infatuation that came with seeing beyond the thin surface and riffling through the next few layers of someone, learning that there was something to admire about them.

The second took much longer to identify, buried as it was under a lot of other, much more personal realizations. It was envy, because already Telemachus was starting to feel the brunt of the expectations put on him by girlhood. Easy grins weren’t really allowed, not by the Council Of Meangirls that he’d later learn populated every schoolyard and every classroom, and Telemachus hadn’t known how to jump out of their path yet. The ones who made up a new trend just to ridicule you for not somehow instantly knowing it.

(He was eight when he asked his mom for a particular type of pants while out shopping. When Penelope had asked why that kind, he’d shrugged helplessly and said that a girl who’d been his friend at the time owned three. Penelope, a survivor of girlhood, understood and bought him the pants. He would later learn that this friend seemed to be the grand ruler of the Council Of Meangirls, and things made a little more sense.)

So, he’d crushed on and envied Peisistratus in equal measure for years, until the crush deepened to love, and he came out and left the complicated web of girlhood behind for the complicated-in-a-different-way web of boyhood.

He wasn’t sure when Peisistratus stopped grinning like that. Like the world was beautiful for him, and no one else’s opinion mattered on that topic. He thought it was a year or so after Telemachus’ dad went missing, when Peisistratus’ grin finally turned wan, or exhausted, or even tinging towards bitter. But Telemachus still loved him, because that part of him, that protective, caring, lovable part, was still alive. That part of Peisistratus, the one that glowed in the sunlight, was still there, even if it was rarely seen.

Telemachus considered himself unimaginably lucky to be allowed to see it when it happened, and he’d long since decided that he loved the messy, tricky parts of Peisistratus too. Every day they got to spend together was a gift.

Peisistratus fell in love with Telemachus a little later. He would not remember that visit to the waterfall, mostly because they’d gone back at least a dozen times before Telemachus moved, but he would admit that there could have been plenty of times he’d caught Telemachus when the latter was about to fall. Bad ankles, and the fact that Telemachus thought so fast that it took his body a second or two to catch up sometimes.

They’d been twelve and thirteen, and Telemachus had come out not very long before. He wasn’t sure what he wanted to do with his hair, his wardrobe, or the concept of puberty as a whole, so he’d called Peisistratus late on a Thursday night to get his opinion on it.

“I don’t know, what if I’m wrong?” Telemachus asked. “What if I regret it?”

“What would ‘it’ be in this equation?” Peisistratus asked, laying in his bed with tired eyes. He wasn’t going to rush Telemachus off the phone, though. He wanted to hear his best friend talk, even if he was panicking about something as he so often was.

“Mom made an appointment for me to get my hair cut,” Telemachus said, quiet and worried.

“Hair grows back, you know. And I’ve seen your baby pictures, you had a whole mess of hair to start with. I bet it’ll grow back fast if you hate it.”

“What if the hairdresser ignores what I tell them I want and gives me something that’s both short and girly? Then I won’t know which part bothers me the most, and we’re back at square one.”

“If that happens, I take my sister’s clippers and we just shave it all off,” Peisistratus suggested. “I think you’ve got the facial structure for a buzz cut.”

“I’m also going to talk to a doctor about some medicine that’ll keep me from. Uhm…” Telemachus trailed off, then whispered his next sentence through his teeth, even though he’d already been talking quietly. “It’s supposed to keep me from going through more puberty.”

He said puberty like it was a swear word, which Peisistratus implicitly understood because he also never wanted to talk about puberty ever again, not after the very short, very awkward talk about changing bodies they’d had in his health class. He had more hair in weird places, and he wasn’t going to think about it any more.

“Is it gonna mean you stay that short?” Peisistratus asked instead.

It worked immediately.

“You’re only like an inch or two taller than me, and you’re older!” Telemachus said in a shouty whisper. “I bet I’ll end up taller than you!”

“Your mom’s taller than your dad,” Peisistratus pointed out. “I think the guys in your family are doomed to shortness.”

Telemachus had sputtered, unsure if he should be endeared or insulted, before eventually settling on, “You’re impossible!”

Peisistratus grinned. He’d won the argument, if that’s what this had been, and he could just imagine Telemachus’ red face on the other side of the phone, eyes narrowed but fighting a grin. His heart clenched so hard and so suddenly, that Peisistratus was briefly worried he was having a heart attack. Or a panic attack, like Telemachus got.

He sat up, nearly dropping the phone, and thumped his chest for a second.

“Peisi? You still there?” Telemachus sounded so worried over the phone line, and Peisistratus faked a cough to give himself a little more time to think up a reasonable answer.

“Yeah, sorry, drinking water and it went down the wrong pipe,” Peisistratus lied.

“Are you okay?” Telemachus asked him, so soft and so sweet that Peisistratus felt his chest do that same thing a second time.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” Peisistratus said.

This time, prepared for it, he recognized the feeling. It was like looking at a beautiful sunset, or a passage in a book that really grabbed him, except it was turned up to eleven. Turned up to electric. It was a little scary, but he wanted it again. Thankfully for him, he had the source on the other end of the phone call.

“Hey, Tele, we should go to the library after class tomorrow,” Peisistratus had said, curling around the phone like it was Telemachus he was holding, small in his hand. “They were supposed to get the new books in today, so they might finally have a copy of Valiant.”

Valiant was a book they’d requested a couple of times. Technically it was meant for older readers, but they’d read the first book in the series and had loved it enough to risk the request. It was about faeries, and New York, and the characters swore and smoked cigarettes, so obviously they’d been fascinated immediately.

“Yeah, we should!” Telemachus said, so excited he forgot about being quiet for a second, before he audibly froze and muttered, “Uh oh,” really quietly under his breath.

And Uh oh was right, because Peisistratus was realizing what that feeling in his chest meant, and what it was. Effervescence under his skin, a strange want to grab Telemachus’ hand even over the phone. He wanted to keep saying things that would make Telemachus laugh or be flustered or anything, really. He just wanted to keep talking to him forever.

He decided to wait, then. Wait until they were a little older, a little more settled into themselves, before he’d try to ask Telemachus out. He had to be sure about it first, make sure it wasn’t just a crush or puberty messing things up for him.

There was also a thin, silly worry he had that probably was unsubstantiated, but it gnawed at him regardless.

Peisistratus had already figured out he was gay by that point. It wasn’t that hard to do; all of his romantic dreams had always featured other guys, and he’d felt an instinctive discomfort in church when the topic was brought up. And now he knew that Telemachus was, in fact, another guy. He worried that the feelings were mixed and muddled by changing the way he thought about his best friend, that putting Tele now into the boy category had caused some sort of backflow of emotion.

So. He waited. Too long. He waited until he got asked out Freshman year, in the middle of the cafeteria, and didn’t know how to say no with so many people watching him, and then it was too late.

Because that had been Andros, and after it ended, Peisistratus was scared that to love someone was to ruin them, even as he craved to love and be loved.

“We hath brought the ‘za!” Telemachus announced as he marched in the front door, arms loaded with boxes. He was followed by Amphinomus and Eurymachus carrying bottles of soda and a chocolate cake.

They unburdened themselves on the kitchen table, and Telemachus went into his mom’s office/art studio/meditation room to give her a hug.

“Sorry for all the traffic lately,” he said into her shoulder. “I’ll make sure we get everything cleaned up tonight.”

“Well, at least you’re being sociable,” she said diplomatically, patting him on the back. She was yet again working on something that required around a million tiny squares of fabric, and apparently a lot of hand sewing.

“I’ll bring you a couple slices of pizza and a big cup of root beer,” he promised her.

“This is why you’re the best,” his mom agreed, giving him a quick kiss on the cheek.

He grinned at her before he scooted out of the room to make good on his word.

In the kitchen, Peisistratus was leaned against the counter, furiously tapping away at his phone. He didn’t seem to be waiting for a response, so Telemachus assumed he was writing about something, not texting a person.

“You alright?” Telemachus asked, purposely bumping into Peisistratus’ side as he reached up to grab a cup from the cabinet. Much like a cat would do.

“Yeah,” Peisistratus nodded. He raked a hand through his hair, pushing it away from his eyes as he stared at the screen. He’d taken his ponytail down and it was hanging in loose waves around his shoulders.

“Whatcha doing?” Telemachus pressed.

“Bleeding openly,” Peisistratus said dramatically, before he shook his head a little bit and turned to Telemachus with a small half smile. “I’m just reading over and editing some of my old poetry, seeing if any of it isn’t horrendously embarrassing. I didn’t realize I’d kept some of my old high school stuff on my account, so it’s been following me phone-to-phone for the last several years. God, but I was melodramatic. I mean, I still am, but at least my current writing doesn’t torture so many metaphors to death.”

“Good to know you’re self aware,” Telemachus nodded, squawking out a laugh when Peisistratus lovingly hip-checked him.

He noticed, out of the corner of his eye, how quickly the smile dropped when he turned away. How Peisistratus’ brow furrowed into something both melancholy and desperate. Telemachus didn’t know how to soothe it away, not if Peisistratus kept pretending to be okay when he was looking.

Sighing to himself, Telemachus instead poured his mom her soda and got a plate of pizza for her.

She was wearing her noise canceling headphone when he dropped off the food, but she still gave him a quick grin as he did.

Out in the hallway was Antinous, who was sort of fidgety, going from arms crossed to in his pockets, then back again. This happened multiple times before he noticed that Telemachus was there, and he twitched in an effort not to jump.

“You alright there?” Telemachus asked. If both Antinous and Peisistratus were acting odd, chances were high that it was related. What had happened in the hour that he’d been gone?

“I need to talk to you about something,” Antinous said, his voice quiet. “But it’s personal, so I didn’t want to say anything in front of the guys.”

Telemachus led them to his room, closing the door behind them.

“Okay, what the hell is happening? You’re acting weird, Peisi is acting weird. Did you two get into an argument or something?” Telemachus asked, pitching his voice low. He didn’t like being left out, and that was exactly what this whole situation felt like.

“Not an argument, no,” Antinous promised. “Peisistratus will have to tell you his thing in his own time, it’s not mine to share. I’m just maybe overthinking some things and needed to check in with you about it before I lose my mind. One of my problems is that I can try and self reflect all I want, but I also can be very bad at it sometimes, until I abruptly realize I might have been acting like a dick.”

This was a version of Antinous that Telemachus didn’t think he’d ever really seen before. Maybe a split second, blink-and-you-miss-it, when they’d hooked up that first time, but never this raw and nervy. He was used to Antinous being the confident one, the one with an oversized ego that was unexplainably charming to him, as much as he would find it annoying on anyone else. This version had its charm as well; Antinous seemed a little more human this way.

“Alright, I can be your sounding board for a second,” Telemachus said.

“Thank you,” Antinous said in a rush of breath, some of the tension leaking away from his spine.

He took the breath back in. “I’m sorry for the way I was acting when I first showed up. The way I was pressing you about grabbing coffee or giving an interview. I was being facetious, messing around, but I think I was being more annoying than funny.”

Telemachus blinked. Out of all the things Antinous could have said, he hadn’t expected this topic.

“You kinda were being annoying, that’s true,” Telemachus said. “But I’m going to be honest that a lot of the anger I had about it was due to the other people that have showed up here asking for interviews. A lot were way more persistent than you, and a lot were more dangerous than you.”

Sometimes, Telemachus could still feel the grip around his wrist that day he’d almost been dragged into someone’s car. He’d talked it to death in therapy, but the wound only grew larger the more people came there to dig through their metaphorical scraps. While no one had ever officially tried to take him again, there was always that possibility. Even when he got into Antinous’ van that first time, he’d done it not because he trusted Antinous, but because he hadn’t really cared if it was a ruse.

“I didn’t give you much of a reason to think any differently,” Antinous said with a shrug that was not as nonchalant as it pretended to be. “I just wanted to make sure you know that you can tell me to back the fuck off if you need me to.”

“I’ll keep that under advisement,” Telemachus told him. “Let’s go have pizza, okay?”

“Okay.”

Peisistratus wasn’t in the house when they got back to the kitchen.

“He went to grab something from his truck, he was saying,” Amphinomus explained when they asked where he’d gone off to. “He seemed a little manic, to be perfectly honest. But just like, a little smidge.” He’d added the last sentence because of the face Telemachus must have been making.

Telemachus grabbed a slice of pepperoni pizza, and went to go check on his best friend.

Peisistratus was in the bed of his truck, pawing through the miscellaneous junk that he’d accumulated over the years he’d had it, cheese pizza slice in one hand as he searched with the other.

“What’s going on? You’re in a mood of some kind and I can’t read you today,” Telemachus told him.

“I’m working through something,” Peisistratus said somewhat dismissively. “I know I fucking had it back here- ah! There it is!”

Triumphantly, he pulled out a wooden baseball bat and set it on the side of the bed. He went back into the pile to pull out a canister of tennis balls, and set them next to it. He put the pizza between his teeth to free up both hands as he jumped out of the truck bed, then scarfed it down once his feet were on the driveway.

“I’m going to the backyard. Can you throw these at me?” Peisistratus asked, handing the canister of tennis balls to Telemachus.

“Why?” Telemachus asked back, though he did take the canister.

“I’m trying a new idea out,” Peisistratus said, grabbing the bat and giving it a few test swings. “It’s called ‘I can’t afford therapy and I’m real mad about it’. I’m gonna try and hit the balls into the side of your old shed. The one you almost knocked over with the lawnmower last summer.”

“Good times,” Telemachus nodded. They’d just switched to a riding mower, and he was not used to it. He forgot there was a reverse pedal.

So, they did just that. Telemachus would huck a tennis ball to Peisistratus, Peisistratus would either miss or send it flying into the already-dented wall of the shed. The podcasters came out and watched them for a while, cheering them on.

After a bit, Peisistratus lit back up. He fixed his ponytail back in place, took off his coat, and adjusted his stance into something more steady. He groaned when he missed, whooped when he hit, but the grin stayed. It wasn’t the un-self-conscious ease of those childhood grins, but there was something sharp and savage to it that made the heartbeat in Telemachus’ chest thrum faster. Something about it was truer than it had been in a long while.

After dinner had been cleaned up, and the podcast trio had already left to get back to their Airbnb, Telemachus grabbed onto Peisistratus’ hand. Not hard, just tight enough to make him look up.

“Do you want to talk about whatever that was?” Telemachus finally asked.

The expression that Peisistratus had was rueful.

“I can’t. Not yet. If I start to talk about it, I won’t be able to go into work tomorrow. Next day off I get, I’ll show up here and tell you, okay? I just have to process this on my own first,” he said, thumb rubbing against the side of Telemachus’ hand.

“Did Antinous do something to you?” Telemachus asked, even as he felt guilty for it. He’d started to trust Antinous, and he didn’t like that this trust could be lost so easily. But from where he was standing, Peisistratus had been alone with Antinous, and suddenly they were acting strange. It made sense if that’s what it was.

“No, he didn’t,” Peisistratus assured him. “We did get a little handsy in the van, but that was a mutual decision. I just realized a couple of things, and need to work through it.”

“Handsy and mouthy, I’d bet,” Telemachus mumbled, just because he knew it would make Peisistratus laugh. Which it did.

“Thanks for looking out, though,” Peisistratus said once he’d stopped giggling. “Really, I am glad to have you, you know? And—” Peisistratus cut himself off, eyebrows twitching in thought as he looked at Telemachus.

Instead of saying anything else, he just drew Telemachus in for a tight hug, burying his face in Telemachus’ shoulder.

“I promise, I won’t let you stay in the dark for too long,” Peisistratus said, mouth so close to the skin of Telemachus’ collar that it almost sent shivers down his spine.

“I’ll hold you to it,” Telemachus breathed out.

Then Peisistratus was gone, out the door with one last look back, one last small smile that was just for Telemachus.

Telemachus took one of his emergency migraine meds, because his right eye was starting to throb, and went to bed.

Chapter Text

“Nausicaa,” Peisistratus said warningly.

“Hm?”

“Why is it so…blue?”

Nausicaa looked at the tube in her hand, flipping it to see the back, though there was only so much scrutinizing she could do when she’d already taken out her contacts.

“Well, according to the label, some kind of seaweed,” she said eventually, slapping another tiny spatula full of mud mask onto Peisistratus’ face and making him twitch.

“Nausicaa. I don’t think seaweed can make it quite so Chernobyl blue. Where did you buy this?” He tried to keep his tone very even. He wasn’t sure if it was working; it was starting to kind of tingle, and he wasn’t sure how to feel about that.

“Big Lots was having a sale,” she answered breezily. “It’s also got mint in it.”

“Yeah, I can smell that,” Peisistratus snorted. It was all he could smell right then.

“Don’t move so much, I’m trying to get it even,” she snapped at him.

“Okay, okay. I’ll be still,” he promised, trying to relax against the couch. He didn’t even flinch at the next spatula-ing of the mud onto his face.

“You’re going to have a nice evening of self care or so help me God…”

“I already said I’ll stop moving,” he groused.

“Oh, warn me if it starts to burn.”

“Nausicaa.”

“It’ll be fine. Just relax.”

Peisistratus let his roommate finish applying the mud mask, and since the tingling stayed minor, he guessed it was fine to leave on for the twenty minutes it said was optimal on the tube. While she worked on smothering her own face in questionable mint-scented goop, he went to fish his work uniform out of the dryer and make himself a bedtime drink. Not alcoholic or anything, he was just craving hot chocolate these last few days.

He was interrupted in this task by a knock at the front door. Nausicaa was in the bathroom to make use of the mirror, so he was closest to the door. It was their rule that whoever was closest had to get it, otherwise they’d devolve into playing rock-paper-scissors about it and the person would get impatient or leave. He really hoped it wasn’t their landlord; the guy had been weird about Jazzercise during apartment inspections, even though they were paying pet rent and the cat was registered as an ESA.

When he opened the door, however, it was not the landlord. Standing there, holding a long rectangular box over one shoulder, was Neo. He looked like he’d been getting ready for bed himself, in pajama pants and slippers, but he’d thrown a coat over it and was wearing a slightly too large Hawaiian shirt, his hair pulled back with a headband.

“Uh. Hi?” Peisistratus said/asked. They knew each other a little bit, mostly because Neo used to come to PFLAG bar nights, but they were not the ‘showing up at Peisistratus’ apartment at nine at night’ type of close.

“Hey, so, weird thing, and you’re probably going to think I’m crazy,” Neo said, holding out the box until Peisistratus took it, “but this belongs with you. Callie and I were talking about your spooky cryptid problem, and this fell off the shelf when I said your name.”

Peisistratus looked to the box- unlabeled, kinda heavy- then back to Neo, unsure what to say.

“Anyway, I wasn’t using it. It’s been smoke cleansed with pineapple sage and dragon’s blood, and I’ve included the care instructions if you need them. What kind of oil it needs and whatnot. Also,” and at this he handed Peisistratus a container of something extremely red, “borscht! Good for the soul. I tried to give some to Telemachus today, but he’s a bit pickier. Doesn’t like beets.”

“Uh. Thanks. I’ll try it,” Peisistratus said. It seemed like the polite thing, even if he was confused as hell.

“Of course. Glad I caught you before you went to bed. Well, see you next time I feel like braving a meeting, give your roommate a hello for me.”

And like that he was heading down the stairs to the apartment parking lot, humming brightly as he did.

Peisistratus went back inside, setting the box on the coffee table. With no small amount of trepidation, he opened it up and stared at what was inside. After a long moment, he started laughing, hard, until he was almost hiccupping. He slapped a hand over his mouth, the other gripping the table to stay balanced.

“What’s so funny?” Nausicaa asked. “What is it?”

Instead of answering verbally, Peisistratus grabbed it by the hilt and hefted it out of the box, holding it up to the light to show her.

Neo had just given him a sword.

To say that Telemachus was too busy the next couple of days to worry about Peisistratus would be an absolute lie. He was never too busy to worry about his friends, especially when it was Peisistratus. Even when it was that time of the week when he had to do the adult thing and go to work. It did, however, take some of the edge off of waiting for the next day Peisistratus had off.

Especially since it was now officially March, and the sample team had been asked to help make Mardi Gras-themed chocolate strawberries for the upcoming day. Which meant that instead of a six hour shift, it was eight hours, and Telemachus spent all of it in the back of the store in the kitchen, dipping berries first into the chocolate, then into a bowl of themed sprinkles, before setting them to dry on the wax paper. It was a little mindless, but it was also fun to make subtle patterns with the sprinkles and leftover chocolate in the few times that they ran out of strawberries and had to wait for more to be washed.

He would walk home at the end of his shift, sleeves spattered in chocolate and sprinkles, his apron in his backpack, munching on a few extra berries that hadn’t been big or pretty enough to sell. It was kind of nice, even if it was still cold.

Antinous and the other two podcast bros hadn’t been outside the house these last couple of days, and Telemachus never thought that he would miss it. They were busy with their own thing, uploading highly edited versions of the events on their patreons, recording their latest episodes, buying rock salt and iron just in case, because it turned out they also watched too much Supernatural.

Not that Antinous wasn’t still constantly texting; he was, and continued half-jokingly offering to send more risqué photos, which Telemachus declined more because he didn’t want to get caught looking than a lack or interest. He was still in that stage of life where, while he was an adult who was allowed to be sexual, it still felt like a secret he had to keep. His mom didn’t know about the Antinous thing, aside from incident one.

Speaking of things his mom didn’t know about, he hadn’t said anything about the camping trip, the visit to Page Of Cups, seeing Neo, or Circe. It was just that it was so easy to talk himself around to the idea that he’d exaggerated the events in his memory, or maybe dreamed them, and he really wasn’t sure about the whole psychics-and-magic stuff. It all just made him feel like he was sort of unraveling, and he had to put it into a specific brain-box lest he lose his mind entirely. It was frustrating, and absolutely tiring.

He made dinner for himself and Penelope, cleaned up, and decided to say ‘fuck it’ to the rest of the evening and just catch up on his sleep. Yeah it was only like seven, he could sleep twelve hours if he didn’t set an alarm sometimes. Everyone else had something they were doing, he was just waiting around for a plan anyway.

So, he took half a calming edible, texted Peisistratus and Antinous good night, and conked out for the night.

He was walking along the edge of the river, his small hand held firm by his father’s. It was biting cold, the ground hard and crunchy beneath his boots, and it made it harder to walk at the brisk pace his father was pushing for. He tried anyway, not wanting to see his father’s brow knit together, pinched in its worry.

“It’s just a little further to Anna,” his father said brightly, though the tone didn’t quite match his face. “Here, pull up your scarf, your nose is all red.”

His father let go of his hand to lean down and fix the scarf instead, tucking it over most of his face to block as much of the wind as possible.

“There we are!”

And it did help. He didn’t feel anymore like his nose was about to break off like an icicle, and the wool of the scarf smelled like sheep, which reminded him of warmer months.

His father sang softly, cheerfully, as they walked, and he sang as well when he knew the song, muffled as it was under the scarf. It helped; he didn’t notice the cold as much when they were singing. His father took the lower register, he took the higher, and things felt more normal than they had in quite a long time.

After the fourth time in a short period that he stumbled over his feet, his father finally took pity on him and picked him up, holding him tightly.

Like a magic trick, Telemachus was walking beside the father and child, and though he was not dressed as warmly as they were, he didn’t feel the cold. He simply observed, watching the man hold his child close to his chest, shielding them from the worst of the wind.

They wore clothes that looked handmade, knitted wool coats that had gone felted with use and washing, leather boots, linen shirts. From watching his mother he knew the difference between machine-made and human-made things. The fabric was probably machined, but the garments themselves were sewn by a careful hand.

The father began to sing again, even more quietly, his words soft and only for the ears of the little kid he held so possessively, so sweetly. Every so often his eyes would go hard, paranoid, and he’d cast his gaze around for anyone who might be listening, might be following. He never seemed to see Telemachus, even as he stayed beside them.

It began to snow, the visibility dropped, and they both shivered harder. Even the father’s hands started shaking, and his steps were jerky.

“Okay, they told me there’s a lot of caves in the cliffside,” the father said, more to himself than to his child. “We’ll make camp in one tonight.”

To his child, much more directly, he said “I heard that caves stay one temperature year round! So they’ll be much warmer than this, at least.”

He kept his tone steady, words sweet, but Telemachus could see where the smile didn’t meet the man’s eyes, which had purple circles underneath.

They stumbled from the bank of the creek towards the cliffs, moving achingly slowly, the father never stopping in his vigilant watch of their surroundings.

Prey, prey, fear, fear, chase, chase. A thrumming echo beneath feet.

They found a cave, and shuffled as far into it as they could and still see the opening. They set their bags down, and the father made the child hide behind one of the rock formations while he went to fetch firewood.

The wait for him to come back was tortuous. Telemachus had half a mind to follow him, to see how far off the father had gone in an attempt to find wood dry enough for the task, but something kept him sitting by the child. He wasn’t as tucked behind rock as the child, but he didn’t think that mattered. In this dream, he was invisible.

Telemachus was often aware when he was dreaming, not that this gave him any ability to control it. He had to play out whatever plot his subconscious had decided to assign him, even when those dreams were…not great ones. This one was okay, sitting quietly beside the child as they set out and reorganized the two bags.

The bag the child had been carrying was mostly small, light things. Candles, a fire starter, a small sewing kit, and easy foods like nuts and dried meat. In the bottom, they kept a spare sweater and socks, the former of which they rolled up to lay their head down on once they’d repacked everything.

The other bag contained the bigger, heavier stuff. Food that needed to be cooked, a small pot to do so, blankets, a hunting knife. Things a child would have trouble carrying on their own. It also contained a big bottle of what Telemachus expected was something alcoholic. The child ignored this in favor of getting out the blankets.

The father returned with kindling, left again, returned with even more wood, and finally started a small fire near the mouth of the cave. It started out a little smoky, but he’d managed to find wood that was dry enough to burn without smoking them out of the cave. The two ate around the campfire, warming themselves until they both finally stopped shivering.

The child fell asleep to the father humming something just to them, pushing back unevenly cut brown hair to lean down and kiss their forehead.

Telemachus blinked and it was later at night, and the child was alone in the cave. The father had stepped out, and was talking in a low voice to someone. The child’s eyes glinted from the edge of the blanket as they stared intently at the shadows. Three strangers. The words being exchanged were muffled, but then came a yell that could be heard clearly.

“Where is it?!” one of the strangers screamed, with such vitriol that it caused Telemachus to move in front of the child, even if it wouldn’t make a difference.

“Don’t know, but not with me,” the father said.

“What, you send it back to the sea you found it in? Or send it back to hell?”

“I don’t know what you’re even talking about,” snapped the father.

“That little—” and the words were muffled again. The child had pulled the blanket over their head entirely and clapped hands over their ears.

The argument continued, and the child shook, and Telemachus felt useless in his role as spectator, not even able to soothe this child as they curled up in fear. He simply sat next to them, in between them and the mouth of the cave, and tried to breathe.

Then a noise shattered through the night, accompanied by a flash. A gunshot. Then two more. The argument was over, and the father was on the ground. He was still alive, but just barely.

“Now. Where is it?”

“Already in Oklahoma,” he choked out, panting through the pain. “Sent ahead a few days ago.”

“Could have just said that the first time,” one of the strangers said, and then shoved the father onto his back with one booted foot.

Then they were gone, running in whatever direction, leaving the child alone with their dying father. For several minutes, there was only silence.

“Sweetheart,” the father whispered once he was sure the strangers had gone, “come here. Please.”

In jerky motions, the child came out from under their blanket, from behind the rock formation, and slowly moved to where their father lay. The two of them clasped hands.

“When morning comes, take what you can and go along the river how we were going earlier. Get to Anna, but be unseen until you find grandma’s place, okay? Can you do that for me?”

The truth was probably not, but the child still nodded like they could, solemn. They brought both bags to the front, so they could repack while they sat vigil with their dying father. He didn’t last more than a few more minutes, and the child waited for him to be gone before they started crying. When they did, the tears were silent.

Telemachus sat vigil with them, thinking about his own father.

As soon as the first tendril of light broke out in the sky, the child hefted the bag onto their shoulders and made their way back to the river, and marched on.

They sang, but it sounded wrong with only one voice, so after a while they stuttered to a stop, and kept going forward in silence.

They had to take a lot more breaks, owing to the heavier loads they now carried- one on their back, and one on their heart. They never rested for long, though. Just until the fear of staying in one place became unbearable, and walking was the better choice of the two. Just trudging through ankle-deep snow, which sometimes they would take a handful of and stuff in their mouth for hydration.

It was late in the day, the sun going down, when the sound of dogs and men reached them and they started running. One of the men was there the night before, the gun he carried the one that killed the child’s father. The child could see his face in their mind, glowing with malice in the flash of light. They saw it again, there in the twilight.

The shot missed them, but blasted into a head-sized rock and shattered it. A sharp shard lanced through their pants and the skin on their thigh, only centimeters away from a major artery. They ran regardless, like the pain was nothing to them, because all that mattered was to reach a place to hide.

They dashed into the woods, twisting and turning until they’ve lost the men and dogs. They left smears of their blood on the trunks of trees in misleading directions, hopped a small creek, and found an outcropping of rock where they could fling themselves, raking dead leaves and snow over their small body until all that peered out was their eyes. They waited like that until the sun had set, and the sounds of the men and the dogs had faded away hours before. Eventually, they crawled out, one leg of their pants stained with a startling amount of blood.

They found another cave, this one very small, but big enough for them and Telemachus to both fit inside. With a sigh, setting their bag to the side, they fixed him with a blank expression.

“What do I do with this?” they asked, indicating their leg. Their voice was empty, flat. A soda that had all the bubbles taken out of it. They sounded so much older than they looked.

“Well, first you should get it clean,” Telemachus told them immediately. “The pants are salvageable if you can sew, they just need a good wash too.”

Telemachus went through the bag, pulling out the sewing kit, one of the lighter blankets, and the big bottle. He popped open the lid and gave a confirming sniff- yup, alcoholic. Something strong as hell, like you’d need to drink it from a thimble.

The child was wearing thin shorts under the pants, though thankfully they’d been spared for the most part. They were only a little bloody at the bottom of one leg, where it had brushed the wound. Together, they and Telemachus moved the leg so the wound was slightly elevated, and Telemachus poured a splash of the alcohol over it. He wiped it clean of dirt and gunk with the edge of the blanket, then poured more over to disinfect.

*

“Looks like you’re going to need a couple of stitches,” Telemachus said, examining the wound. He remembered when the family dog Argos had needed an emergency operation a few years ago; this wound was about that size, so could probably do with the same number. His stitches were going to be terrible, but he’d seen them done before when Nausicaa almost took her finger off with a table saw a few years ago, so he could at least try his best.

The child nodded, accepted a splash of the alcohol to sanitize their hands, and held the edges of the wound together for Telemachus, who sanitized his own hands and the needle and thread before he made his attempt.

It's just like giving yourself your shot, he told himself, even though it wasn’t and he knew it. But it did mean that he knew the amount of pressure needed to put a needle through skin, at least.

It took four crooked, uneven stitches before Telemachus was sure that the wound wouldn’t pop back open the second he set the needle down, and the two of them used the knife to cut part of the blanket into bandages. They soaked them in more alcohol, then tied them around the child’s thigh. Since there hadn’t been any sign of anyone else in a long while, they risked a small fire to dry everything.

*

“You know,” the child said with a sigh, relaxing against the wall of the cave, “this was a lot easier than me having to do it all on my own the first time.”

Then Telemachus woke up.

He woke to sleep paralysis, so he stubbornly kept his eyes shut so he didn’t see any of the hallucinations he knew were waiting for him. His hands tingled, but he wasn’t sure if that was part of the paralysis or a side effect of the new meds. Half-dreams ran across his mind, where he broke the paralysis and went to go wash his hands or get a drink, but then he’d blink too hard and be back in his bed, frustrated and realizing he’d never left.

He didn’t know how long he was stuck like that, trying to either wake the rest of the way or to fall back asleep, when he heard his bedroom door open and a jingling sound entering. For a heart-stopping minute he thought about the thing in the woods, but when a warm snout pressed against his hand, he relaxed.

It was Argos, the old boy, who managed to jump on the bed. It finally broke the paralysis, and Telemachus sat up.

“Hey buddy,” he said, giving the dog ear skritchens until that back leg was thumping in glee. “You don’t know how glad I am that you’re here.”

The dog lolled his head against Telemachus’ stomach, like he was indicating that he very much knew how much he’d just helped Telemachus out.

“Maybe I should just move your bed into my room, and you can come get snuggles when I’m having sleep issues,” Telemachus told the dog. His mom wouldn’t approve- the dog bed was already in her room, because Argos helped her sleep too.

Argos was ancient. He was declared old a decade ago, but never seemed to let that stop him. He was a cute dog, half Labrador retriever, half Dachshund. He’d gotten all of the best traits from each of his respective breeds, except that he had a lab appetite and a Dachshund metabolism, so he got fat if you even thought about giving him a piece of bacon. He was the best dog regardless, and Telemachus would hear no other word about it. In his younger days he was pest control, keeping moles out of Penelope’s garden, and barking loud enough to scare off some of the earliest podcast assholes who tried to come by.

With Argos at his side, it was much easier for Telemachus to get back to sleep.

Peisistratus had planned to get off work and drive straight to Telemachus’ house, to wait until his friend was off shift. Unfortunately, he still wasn’t sure what he wanted to say. He didn’t know how to explain it, and he had trouble even saying the word for what happened to him. He kept wanting to just say ‘assault’, but that just made it seem like Andros had hit him, and as shitty of a boyfriend as Andros was, he’d never raised a hand to Peisistratus like that. Peisistratus would look in the mirror, say “I was…” and then, while his mouth would form the shape of the ‘R’, he couldn’t say it.

He'd procrastinated until he got the message from Telemachus that he was tired and turning in early, then Peisistratus decided he'd made the right call.

So, it was Monday evening and he was in that college town, walking down the street with all the bars and clubs, not going into any of them. He kicked at snow and bits of glass and the remains of that weekend’s Mardi Gras parade- beads and glitter, mostly. They always held it the weekend before the actual holiday, which he felt missed the point.

His feet carried him to where the coffee shop used to be, but they’d closed down for good. It was next to a sex shop he’d never been in, closed for the night but set to move to a new location soon. He sighed at himself. The coffee shop had been closed for years, he didn’t know why he kept expecting it to still be there. He made himself keep walking.

The night was cold, but he hardly noticed it. Music spilled out from doorways, enticing people inside. There weren’t that many people around though; just a few drunk college kids making poor choices, and one Peisistratus, also making dumb choices. He didn’t even know why he was there. He certainly didn’t want to walk into any of the businesses and risk running into someone he knew, or to be surrounded by all that noise. It wasn’t even that late yet.

Then he was standing in front of a church. The Episcopalian church that he remembered because his choir class had performed there once. It was technically unlocked, but he didn’t really want to go inside. Instead, he just sat down on one side and rested his back against stone.

He wasn’t Episcopalian. His childhood church had been…well, not a very good one. Insular and judgy and only too willing to call someone devil-touched. They’d believed in speaking in tongues, so much so that when one of the preachers made a light joke at the practice’s expense, it had nearly torn the church apart and the preacher stopped teaching there. It left Old Bob, the dude in his eighties who didn’t know what he was talking about most of the time, to cover those Sundays until they could talk a new preacher into the slot. That had been when Peisistratus officially stopped going.

He’d unofficially stopped going when he volunteered to organize the church library, thought the title of a book was interesting, and read through the first few pages. Then the author had compared her son being gay to her other son dying due to cancer, and Peisistratus had suddenly found he had all of these things that could only be done on Sundays, so don’t wait for me mom and dad. He finished the organizing, though. He kept his promises.

He wished he had a pack of cigarettes. Something a little self destructive that he’d get frowned at for, but no one would really stop him. His dad smoked, his mom did sometimes, and about two thirds of his siblings did, so they’d all be fucking hypocrites if they stopped him. But no, he wasn’t going to. His occasional pot use was as much lung damage as he wanted to give himself.

So he sat there, back against the church, and waited to see what would happen. If he’d get some sort of sign, or if a priest would come out and shoo him away. Nothing but Peisistratus sitting there and staring up at the sky for a long time, light pollution obscuring only some of the stars. He couldn’t name any constellations, but he still thought they were pretty.

He didn’t want to be out here. There was nothing for him here, no self destruction he felt was worth it. He didn’t want to be around people and noise and music just to get a shitty cocktail he’d be paying way too much for, not when he could buy a six pack of something, go home, and get drunk on the couch. Then he at least had the cat, who would never judge him because that beautiful moron had nothing but silly string where a brain should be.

So, he scraped himself off the pavement, found his truck, and did just that. Thank god for twenty-four-hour liquor stores, for dumb cats, and for bottled margaritas. And roommates who simply stole one of the bottles and didn’t ask any difficult questions. She even gave him a large brownie for him to decide if he wanted to get crossfaded or not. He decided or not, but he kept the brownie for the next night instead. He was going to need it.

He pet Jazzercise, feeling floaty and dizzy on the couch, and regarded the box that held the sword. They’d just left it on the coffee table, blade loosely wrapped in a spare pillowcase so Jazzercise didn’t try to rub against it, and he and Nausicaa couldn’t accidentally fall and cut themselves on it.

The sword itself was decorative. The hilt was an awkward shape and the balance was wonky, but it had been kept in good condition, and the blade part was solid and sharp. The hilt was shaped like a cat, stylized of course. Peisistratus guessed it was supposed to be a representation of Bastet, the cat goddess. Neo didn’t worship her, per se, but he held a fondness for her.

Peisistratus had seen the pewter figure of the goddess on a necklace Neo always wore, once, when they were both tipsy and maybe making fun of Sophia behind her back. He wore it as a good luck charm for his collection of five cats, to ensure they didn’t get sick. The statuette on his bookcase and tiny Bastet plush were just for aesthetic purposes.

Almost startled, Peisistratus realized he’d gotten up and picked up the sword, blade pointed down. The grip actually felt…right. It was such an odd shape, but the curves of the figure seemed to fit where his fingers rested. He easily rested his thumb on the pommel, between the figure's ears. He ran his thumb along and back, like he was petting Jazzercise.

He flipped it around in his grip and gave a couple of experimental swipes with the blade. He didn’t know how to hold or use it right while sober, certainly not three and a half margaritas in, but he found a way of holding it that felt right. An instructor would probably bap him on the head and yell about his terrible form, but he could hold it how he liked in the privacy of his own apartment.

Laughing at the silliness of it, of having a sword, of being given it just because a witchy friend had decided it belonged to him, he made himself put it back down. He re-wrapped the blade in the pillowcase, making sure it was firmly on the table and not about to fall off. Idly, before he sat back down, he rubbed between the ears of the pommel’s head. One last little ear rub for a good kitty. He didn’t say that out loud; he didn’t know if that would piss off a goddess or not.

He made himself drink lots of water before he went to bed, because he promised himself that he was going to go over to Telemachus’ house and have that dumb hard conversation, and he’d just have to deal with not having all of the perfect words. He was not going to let a hangover give him an excuse to put it off.