FFXIV Misc. Posts

[eightlazylegs]

For Eithyrs related threading.

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Unsundered Perversions

[eightlazylegs]

Hythlodeus liked his job. Mostly. Honestly. He liked seeing people's creativity, their passions, even their silliest and stupidest ideas were charming in their own way.

But it had been nearly nothing but sharks for about a week straight and Hyth was starting to get very tired of sharks.

"This one doesn't even have a way of excreting, it's just a mouth on each end," he lamented, shoving the latest concept submission over to its designated pile. "I wish people would have a little more creativity in their designs."

It had gotten to the point that between meetings or concept reviews he'd started doodling notions of his own in the corners of spare documents. Strange creations, full of spiralling tendrils and bioluminescent fronds. Things he would never have the strength to make on his own, but...that was why you had powerful friends.

Powerful friends who would be home from their extended business trip this evening, as it happened.

[snapandflounce]

The vaunted, untouchable Emet-Selch oversaw death, ferrying the souls of Men to the Aetherial sea, and tasked with making sure it stayed in balance, it's flow undammed and free through the universe. From aether all things sprung, and to aether all things returned -- whether it was Man's creations or Man himself. But some fools had played with concepts that came too close to one side of the line, something that was hungry and ready to tear holes for aether to satiate them. Thus it falls to him to care for the place, to make sure the rogue creations were dispatched and the Aetheric tears they made repaired.

Thus, the man called Hades is absolutely done with any sort of nonsense that requires his work presence, even if he knows full well that if a call for help went out, he would be spurred to action. But what he is this time is ready to rest, to cast off masks and be in the privacy of his own home. Let him simply be Hades for a few hours, with Hades wants and Hades needs.

Right now a nap sounds best. Especially when he knows Hythlodaeus will surely be by after working hours. So that's where he is; head back on the couch, having nodded off sitting there, finally having that spot of rest to let food and drink replenish his aether and body both, rest giving it time to work more effeciently.

[eightlazylegs]

Hyth swans in, all agrin. He's got his mask off even before he sees Emet-Selch, forthright as he is - the man knows he's been gone a while, he knows what Hyth is here for, and if he's surprised at all that Hyth is ready to be railed into the floor then this is an imposter in Emet-Selch's own home.

"People are so uncreative these days!" he calls out by means of welcome. "Did you feed yourself already, dear?"

[snapandflounce]

Lifting his head from where it's rested against the back of his chaise, Emet-Selech huffs softly, before he brings his legs up under him and then stretches.

"I haven't had time to do much of anything," he replies, airily dismissing the idea that he might take good care of himself. "Beyond rest my eyes some." Slinging one arm up on the chair's arm, while the other hang along his side, hand on his hip. He absolutely knows that he looks amazing, and makes no effort to hide it. After all, he knows why Hythlodaeus is here.

The game is now afoot.

[eightlazylegs]

Hyth pulls a few food packets of his sleeves - the kind that's sweetened enough to almost seem extravagent, though of course no one would waste resources purely on making food actually taste good.

"Then eat up," he says, beaming. "You'll need the strength for it." Hyth bites his lip just a bit as he finishes the sentence, letting the implication hang in the air.

[snapandflounce]

"If I must," Emet-Selch says, so burdened by the needs of others, so terribly salty about it. He pulls open the packet, and eats his little snack cake still watching Hythlodaeus from beyond the fringe of his parted hair.

"And you?" he asks, still prim as he delicately nibbles his cake. "What, exactly, are you dropping in for?"

He knows why.

[eightlazylegs]

Hyth sidles over and then deposits himself squarely in Emet-Selch's lab, legs dangling over the chair arm. He tosses his braid back over his shoulder with a smirk.

"Ah, you know what I want. But is it more fun if I tell you anyway?"

He brought his cake to his lips and took a delicate lick of it, slow and deliberate.

Gaius and Estinien: An education

[snapandflounce]

If you had asked Gaius what he had been thinking when he came into this agreement with Valdeaulin, he would admit that he was likely concussed and not in his right mind. He still accepted the agreement, as he was a man of his word, and that means that when it came time Valdeaulin could take his life if he still deemed it necessary for the justice he needed to exact for Eorzea. It was, in Gaius' mind, only fair. After all, the strong rule the weak, and Valdeaulin had found him when he was weak and taken his due as the stronger party.

However, this agreement apparently did not preclude other punishments. One of them had briefly presented itself in the Azure Dragoon - a man Gaius could share something like honest camaraderie with -- seeing as Ishgard and Garlemald has never managed to be in true, direct conflict. That's why, in his spite, Valdeaulin has suggested to Estinien that they are obviously up to something; how else could he view Gaius favorably, if he wasn't putting the lance to the fallen legatus?

Gaius had not been lancing anything, or getting lanced, or any of the sort. Instead, he was just sitting there with a sheaf of notes and some Ala Mhigan tea, trying not to think about anything except the liberation of Garlemald from Ascian machinations. No more, and no less.

Re: Gaius and Estinien: An education

[eightlazylegs]

Estinien was the kind of man used to thinking about exactly one thing at a time, and usually that one thing was stabbing. Now he had multiple things to think about and it was starting to make his head hurt a little.

An Azure Dragoon was not expected to marry and sire children, or to even be that good at making friends. It would only cause more harm once you'd died, and death was almost certain in that job, so why bother? Almeric certainly hadn't stressed it during Estinien's upbringing, or his training.

It also m eans that when he does have a concern, he's exceedingly blunt about it. Gaius will find his solitude interrupted by six and a half of feet of spiky, blood-tempered armor looming quietly in his vicinity, attempting to phrase an awkward question.

[snapandflounce]

Gaius turns his pale eyes up to the Azure Dragoon, covered in armor and taller than Gaius is by at least a few inches. So he puts his papers aside, and looks up at him, stoic as ever.

"Do you need something?" he asks, deceptively mild. Internally, he wonders if some thing has spoiled their unspoken truce, or Estinien has some new cause for upset. Gaius can't bring himself to bemoan his state as a semi-pariah; both a failed would-be conqueror and a Garlean defector doesn't win him much favor - even the Scions barely tolerate him.

Something must be up. He just hopes whatever it is, he can solve it quickly.

[eightlazylegs]

It's hard to tell with Estinien, blank as his face often is. You know when he's angry, but the rest of the emotions are all a muddled mess when it comes to expression.

"Your mage seems to be under the impression of...something," he opens, awkward and vague as it is. He's not even sure what the implication is. It had a lot of pointed looks to it and Estinien's never been good at interpreting those. That was Aymeric's job.

[snapandflounce]

"Valdeaulin is not my mage, and he would certainly take insult at the very suggestion," Gaius says, folding his hands over his work, letting some weight rest on his arms on the table. "What is he under the impression of?"

There are a thousand things: that Estinien thinks higher of Gaius than he should, perhaps. That he has been made away that Valdeaulin intends to encompass judge, jury and executioner. But he should think that neither of these two things would discomfit the Azure Dragoon.

[eightlazylegs]

"Mmm." Estinien looks off and to the side, mulling his words over. "We had been speaking of...the nature of grief and vengeance. A matter, as I'm sure he is loathe to let you forget, that he struggles with. I told him how I had made piece with Nidhogg, in part through having merged with his shade and felt his rage inside of me."

He falters not when speaking about his trauma, but in speaking of his confusion. "And he made some comment to the effect that he had not had such an experience with you, but mayhaps I had. I was...unsure of his meaning."

He had been smirking at the time. Estinien already has a bad feeling about this.

Re: Gaius and Estinien: An education

[eightlazylegs]

When they finally reach the village, and that inn, the next day a fight nearly breaks out. It's because there's only two rooms - Valdeualin insists he take the one with Gaius, while Estinien bunks with Severa. The innkeeper's wife finds it unseemly that Severa would bunk with a man who's clearly not her husband. Severa does not actually care. And Estinien...Estinien really wanted that shared bed.

It's Severa who actually rescues the entire situation, by getting Valdeulin so drunk over dinner he falls asleep barely after sunset. As she arrives to trade places with Gaius, she mutters to him as they pass, "Don't say I didn't do you any favors."

Estinien's waiting across the hallway, stripped of his armor and vibrating like a hive of bees.

[snapandflounce]

"I won't forget it," Gaius said, striding across the hall past her as she went to his space and he took his scant possessions with them to the other room, dropped them in the corner and was on Estinien in a heart beat. They could -- have room to move, to touch, to not have to bend or crouch worry about pine needles in their hair.

"We are going to fuck," he says, between harsh kisses, scraping his teeth long Estinien's lower lip. He is already working on the soft padded tunic, the leather breeches, "because I cannot be arsed to wait until we've both properly bathed. But after-- we are going to, and then I am sure we will find it in ourselves to fuck again."

[eightlazylegs]

"Should--should I--" He'd had plans when he was waiting here, thought of it as a process with careful steps. Then Gaius walked in and Estinien's dick sat up and begged, and suddenly he's totally pliant, wanting to be guided and obedient.

He has no idea why this man does this to him. Gaius's kisses seem to wipe his mind full clean.

[snapandflounce]

"Should you what, Wyrmblood?" Gaius asks as he marks up the man's neck, happy to make sure Valdeaulin will know that he was here, that he got what he wanted. Though Valdeaulin might take Gaius' life some day, the life he has in his hands now is still his to determine. The life he wanted right this moment, was soaking up Estinien's warmth and taking this scant, blissful comfort.

Gaius has not stopped walking, really -- he's pushing back on his lover with guiding force, not a cruel one, until they're up against the wall on one side of the bed, Gaius pushing his knees between Estinien's powerful thighs. When the dragoon's breeches unlaced, Gaius is happy to find that the surge of arousal has Estinien all but popping out of his smalls-- he pulls those loose, too, and strokes him in hand. "Tell me what you think you should do?"

[eightlazylegs]

If he wanted a concrete answer he shouldn't have taken Estinien's cock in his hand. The dragoon is powerful but his frame is slighter than Gaius, and he all but melts in the man's hand so that thigh is half of what's keeping him from hitting the floor entirely. Soft gasps come from his throat as he tries to muster his words.

"Should--I want to...want to..."

Re: Gaius and Estinien: An education

[eightlazylegs]

The next morning Estinien is expecting some form of blowback. On a deeper level he knows nothing in his life that is good can come without Nymeia taking another thing as compensation for his happiness, and misery waits around every peaceful corner.

On a surface level, he knows Valdeaulin exists.

Strangely, the man does not lash out at them for conspiring to have sex on his watch. Estinien even barricades the watercloset door when he uses it just in case Valdeaulin decides to ambush him at his most vulnerable again, but the man gives no critique. Perhaps it's that Severa had words with him last night, or he had words with himself, but if anything the man seems completely disinterested in discussing who spent their night with who.

It's not until they reach the capitol proper that anyone gets time alone, regardless. With the civil war heating up it's surprisingly easy for them to slip in unnoticed, especially with an unmasked Gaius leading them, and they take shelter in an unoccupied building previously under the XIVth's occupancy. Estinien wears his hood loose over his ears and tight over his forehead, and broad as he is for an Elezen he at least can escape being picked out of the crowd. Less so for Valdeaulin, grumpily staying hidden with his facial tattoos giving the entire game away.

CidNero and Mad Science

[eightlazylegs]

When Nero left after the Omega incident, it had taken everytthing Cid had (including several long talks with Biggs and Wedge) not to chase him down. The more he tried to hold tight to Nero, the more he'd struggle. That was in the man's nature, he was like a damn housecoeurl that way.

So he waited, and fretted, and did what he did whenever something kept him awake at nights: he worked. The concept seemed vaguely obscene, based on several civilian-use machina he'd heard about but never personally purchased, and Cid comforted himself with the notion that if Nero returned and turned him down for good at least he'd be able to put it to personal use afterwards.

Preparing the device did put him in mind of some of the more ecletic reading he'd done as a youth. He'd adored the boys' adventure novels with their young, stalwart Garlean lads facing off against savage hordes and corrupt engineers. Bigoted as all get out, obviously, and just as much a part of the propaganda machine of Garlemald as their daily news reports on the radio but it didn't make them not fun.

Cid had often found himself coming back over and over to the scenes of the viewpoint Strapping Lad, or perhaps a Gasping Maiden, chained to a worktable as a cackling mad scientist went over them with clinical precision, examining and touching them as if they were no more than just another experimental subject. The idea of being that subject had thrilled him, just a little - or of being the one inflicting such cold inspections upon a partner.

And he had to admit, Nero did make an excellent mad scientist.

[snapandflounce]

Nero went to the closest thing that could be home -- Mor Dhona. It was in sight of the Agrius (the warship of the XIVth and once his actual home, for the most part) and a Imperial Installation. Even if he didn't really miss the Empire, he still did miss home sometimes. So he had taken over the parapet of building that had housed the Mor Dhona Ironworks office, and made it his own.

(Technically, it still belonged to the Ironworks, so he felt doubly entitled to it for lodging. Also, it meant nobody contested its ownership and the only adventurer squatting there was him.)

He stayed there for a time while he finished his post-Omega recovery and waited for things to die down. So while terror yet loomed on the horizon in the form of Zenos, he had not yet struck. Nobody had yet been called to Werlyt to help with the G-Warrior. All of that was in fairly near future. For Nero, the now was resting, reading, and occasionally having nightmares about nearly fucking snuffing in in an Ala Mhigan desert.

(Once or twice, he could be found masturbating to Cid's hand on him, gripping him tight. Sure, he'd been dying at the time, but-- he couldn't remember the last time Cid held him so crystal clearly as that, and he didn't want to say how strange and conflicted it made him feel.)

Eventually, though, eventually he wanders back after he's done a couple of delves an at least one job for Rowena. Cid has to be up to something useful by now, right? So he strolls into the workshop in his red uniform like he wasn't simply gone for weeks before, and goes to make coffee without a how-do-you-do despite the fact he'd fucked off right out of his sickbed the last time anybody saw him. (Not to mention, half a million gil richer.)

[eightlazylegs]

Cid is understandably a bit tense when he shows up. Trying not to seem relieved, trying not to seem angry. Maybe he'd even been able to articulate those feelings once they were alone, if Nero hadn't bickered and made the temperature rise further.

To the point that he was slamming Nero into a wall the second they were alone and kissing him hard enough to bruise.

[snapandflounce]

It was going so well (it was not) so of course he had to make a snide comment about coffee (just because) and of COURSE Cid had to be bitchy back (it was absolutely unnecessary because Nero was obviously right about the coffee.) He hadn't expected Cid to get violent.

...then he realized it wasn't violent. Well, not like that, anyway. Even with Cid being a full fulm shorter than he was, was grabbed, slammed, and with Cid keeping him pinned low enough to forcefully kiss, he ended up with one leg under him and the other hooked around Cid's thigh.

Stop him? Fight him? Perish the thought. He grabbed on with both hands and vied for control of the kiss, one hand fisting in Cid's hair and the other in his coat.

[eightlazylegs]

By the time Cid caught himself he was already deep in the kiss, and pulling back from his impulsive act wasn't going to be an option. He slammed Nero against the wall, tongue diving between his lips. No plan, just 'keep this man here'.

[snapandflounce]

Nero had his plan; and it was grab for the buckles that kept the heavy apron and undo them, starting the furious process of trying to rip Cid's clothes from his body. After all, this is exactly what he craved from Cid: acknowledgement, attention, desire -- even with the abiding current of anger, his cock was already half hard in his trousers and he had dropped his leg to make it easier to tear more clothing off him.