fandomtownies | Devil's Nest | Thursday Evening

There was a good chance that Gladio was not going to let the fact that the axes were chew toys stop him this week. It might actually be an interesting challenge, in fact.

All he knew for sure was that he had some time to kill tonight; it would probably be a while before he got the expected text to let him know if he was good to head back to the apartment tonight or if he'd have to figure out a couch to crash on instead.

Although, really, he definitely was contemplating just hitching a tent up in the preserve, too, regardless of how the date wound up.

"Annie," he nodded as he leaned forward on the bar. "What's the recommendation tonight?"

"Depends on if you like creaminess in a drink or not," Annie offered thoughtfully, considering what she would actually recommend. "I love a White Russian, but it's pretty, like, creamy and milky, and not everyone's into that, and that's where you get the Black Russian -- same drink, no dairy."

A pause, and, "And then there's the espresso thing, if you, like, don't care about when you go to sleep." Because there was for sure real espresso being used there, and Annie didn't know if she would be able to fall asleep a few hours after having one of those.

"I'm...probably in for a late night, anyway," Gladio admitted with a faint snort of a laugh, "so maybe we'll just start with the first one and work our way through. Good thing about co-teaching with a Friday morning class, right?"

Annie grabbed the stuff she'd need to make the drink while shooting over a look that was probably more concerned than necessary, all things considered. "What's going on? I mean, totally make Dwight do all the work in the morning, anyway, I fully support that, but is this a good-late-night situation or a bad one?"

"To be determined," Gladio informed her with a grin that took no time at all in going a bit crooked and devious, with a lift his brows to match. "Specs has got himself a date. And I'm playing the supportive roommate by staying clear unless there's signs of imminent disaster."

"Wait, wait, is this a second date?" Annie asked, fairly sure of who Specs was. (She, of course, knew him as Shoe Guy.) "Summer told me a little about this last week -- do you have, like, a whole scrunchie-on-the-doorknob situation going?"

Annie, who had had a very sheltered life until fairly recently, had absolutely never put a scrunchie (or a sock, or insert-your-college's-variant-here) on a doorknob. But she'd seen movies, okay?

Gladio, who only even knew what a scrunchie was because he had a sister, had to laugh. "It is second date," he confirmed, now faintly impressed by the way news traveled fast in a small town, but then also, really not, because, well, squirrels, and he shook his head "Nothing that complex. He's just going to send me a text."

Though now he was starting to contemplate what the Ignis equivilent of a scrunchie-on-the-doorknob (which was apparently a thing?) would be. A pair of suspenders? One of his gloves? Not exactly as subtle. There might be something to that scrunchie thing.

"But for now, you're in, like, roommate exile?" Annie suggested, looking amused as she set the Black Russian in front of him with a little smile. "Oh, man, what if he never texts you, Gladio? That's so nice of you to clear out and give them their space."

Though, like, if he ended up having to roam the town so Ignis could have a nice date, that would probably be less than ideal. (Though Annie herself had both a couch and a probably-unoccupied guest room to offer, so it would certainly not come to that on her watch.)

"Roommate exile," Gladio confirmed, with a nod and a lift of the drink as if to toast to the sacrifices one made for the sake of their bros. "But I got options, especially since you know what? I hope it does go well for him. It'll be good for the guy to let loose for a change. Prompto's got a couch, and if that fails, I've got a tent."

He was going to just grin as he took a sip of his drink after that, wondering if what he assumed would be Annie's reaction to that would be spot on.

"Gladio," Annie said gravely (probably as expected), "hon, it is February. And the groundhog saw its shadow yesterday so, like, it is not even remotely spring or warm enough to camp, no."

Not that she could stop him, but like...it just seemed like a real 'Let's Call That Plan B' situation.

Well. It wasn't exactly what he was expecting, but he'd gotten it pretty damn close.

Which meant he was just going to grin even more with his very solid, inarguable counterpoint.

"It's not even snowing."

"No, instead it's raining," Annie pointed out, logically. "And there's a whole range between 'snow' and 'appropriate camping weather,' anyway. Are you, like, trying to get pneumonia?"

"There's nothing wrong with camping in the rain if you've got good gear," Gladio insisted, "which I do."

And Annie was even spared rge product placement, because the Coleman^TM branding was much more subtle than the Cup Noodle^TM stuff.

"But," he offered, "I promise I'll at least check in with Prompto first. How's that?"

"Preferable," Annie decided, and like, maybe she should follow up with Prompto on that? But she was also not anyone's babysitter here, and Gladio was certainly capable of looking after himself. (Although if he ever came in here with so much as a sniffle, the I Told You So would be epic. And then, like, replaced with an apology and a hot drink.) "I also have a couch, if you need it. We even have a guest bedroom. Just throwing that out there, if it comes down to the tent."

"I'll add that to the list," Gladio grinned faintly. "I've got a few other options after the tent, too, you know."

He just liked the tent! It would have probably been first if it weren't for the fact that Annoying Prompto was just slightly higher on the priorities than Roughing It Like the Manly Man that He Was.

He gave her a nod, though, of gratitude before having another drink. "But thanks for looking out, Annie."

"I mean, I can't let my only regular get frostbite," she noted, with a heavily put-upon sigh. "I would never forgive myself. I'd have to give you free drinks for life."

Nice disincentive there, Annie.

(Also, like, of course he had other places to go. Look at him. If he ended up in a tent tonight, Annie was also of the opinion that Gladio might need to set up a Tinder profile or something.)

Hey, now, getting a tent all to himself was a luxury that he was not going to get much of in the coming years; he had to enjoy that sort of thing while he could!

"I've managed to not get frostbite so far yet," Gladio pointed out with a grin. "Don't plan on changing that any time soon, and I...don't really think that'd be your fault, anyway."

"Yeah, but this is the ugly depth of winter," Annie pointed out, ominously. "If you're gonna get frostbite, it'd be like, now, not in November."

Please be more dramatic, Annie. Please.

"But I will also concede," she added, "that I'm not really a tent kind of gal at the best of times." Now, a cabin? She could get behind a cabin. But Annie needed running water and real walls to survive, please, no matter what lies she told herself. (Plus, like, her powers very much depended on some version of civilization being nearby, too! It would suck to, like, run into a bear and be miles from electricity!)

"It's definitely not for everyone," Gladio admitted easily with a shrug, and a chuckle, for Little Miss Ecotourism B&B, "as...some of my students definitely found out today, but honestly? I love it. I bet the summers around here are going to be great for camping."

Which made it even more tragic that he wasn't (spoiler alert) going to be around to enjoy it, but at least he was not going to be lacking in the camping experience.

Oh no, that really was a tragic spoiler!

"It does get very nice around here in the summer," Annie admitted. "Kind of on the muggy side. And, oh, God, last year was like, a record-breaking summer for cicadas? For...some reason?"

Nature...reasons?

"So there were bugs this big," she said, holding her thumb and forefinger a good two and a half inches apart, "everywhere, all last summer. And they're noisy, too."

That spoiler wasn't even the start of that tragedy, really.

But for now, there just trying to get over how cute of a bug those must have been.

"That big?" asked Gladio, holding up his own hand in an estimation to match Annie's, then his brows lifted. "That's all? Were they babies?"

Look, bugs on Eos were not fucking around.

Annie gave him a purposely flat look, arching one brow skeptically. "Are you, like, a secret Australian?" she asked, shaking her head. "No, they were fully grown! And they yelled, all the time!"

Annie may have been a superhero who lived with another superhero and they both had fought a lot worse than some cicadas, but that didn't mean that whatever bugs and spiders that made it into MHA #2 weren't dispatched in wildly overdone, knife-or-blast-related ways. Because gross. Gross.

"I am not," Gladio assured her, "but I was in Australia just before this. They got big bugs over there, too? But, yeah, no, certain parts of Lucis? You can find some about..." He thought about it for a moment, before his own hands spread out in about a foot's distance, then, reconsidering, moved it out to about a foot and a half.

"That big? And those are just the little ones. They don't yell, though, I'll give you that much. Don't get me started on the spiders, though."

Really, though, with that in mind, Prompto's aversion to creepy crawly things wasn't all that unfounded...

The axes were not a draw for Stark. Neither was the piano on other nights. It was a friend behind the bar that brought him in here again this week. Friendly faces were a good thing. Better than sitting alone for another night in any case. And the alcohol didn't hurt.

"Hello, Annie. Could I have the espresso one?"

Might as well just lean into the not sleeping well, right?

Annie also had had an espresso martini for her shift drink when she first got here -- partially because she herself needed the boost today, too, but also because it had sounded yummy and she needed to practice before she'd served it to anyone.

So that got a bright, "Nice choice, Stark," as she gathered the ingredients and a shaker. "How are you doing?"

It didn't seem...great?

Stark was almost tempted to say he was fine, except that was extremely untrue and unlikely to be even slightly convincing.

"I've been much better," he finally settled on as a response. "Nothing much is helping yet. Summer tried, with the sangria."

"Summer's good like that," Annie said carefully, nodding. "And the sangria helps with, like, talking."

Not that she'd gone to Summer with a romantic problem when they'd last had a real Talk It Out-style sangria night, but hey, who didn't like a little discussion of sexual assault and disillusionment over wine and fruit?

"But," she added, mixing up the drink, "sangria can't help everything, I guess." And unfortunately the answer she did have wasn't exactly comforting -- that it was just going to be a time thing, probably.

"I don't know if the talking helped either. I slept a little more." But that was probably due to drinking roughly an entire pitcher of sangria more than anything else.

"She wants to take me to a spa. And Rey,now. She said that might help too."

"Oh, the space one?" Annie asked, wide-eyed and appreciative. "Yeah, honestly, Stark, that place is great."

But. But.

"But," she added, setting the now completed martini before him with a little sigh, "it's not going to fix anything. It's just going to be...you know, relaxing."

...which, like. Maybe he could really super use, what with the sleeplessness. Rey, too (and Annie was already kicking herself for staying late at work last night and missing her, too, once she'd caught up on the radio broadcasts.)

"Nothing is going to fix it," Stark said flatly, reaching for the drink. Aside from a miraculous reappearance or at least some sort of communication.

"But I've never been. To any spa." So he could go and be distracted, for a little while, by being utterly bewildered by the entire experience.

"Last time we went, we took Diego's brother's now ex-girlfriend. She's a mannequin," Annie shared, because that was probably a distraction right there in and of itself. "But it can be fun. Lots of treatments for, like, skin and nails and stuff."

She blew out a breath, debating how much else to say. "But like...I think the only thing for this is, like...time? Which sucks, but I've been there. Breakups always hurt."

And in Annie's experience, it didn't help a lot when you had, like, a good reason to break up, either. Sometimes things just...ended, and it sucked no matter why they had.

"I know it takes time. I told you once I'd been left behind before." Because he hadn't been enough before, either. "And time doesn't fix it. Time just lets you learn to live with it. Maybe."

"Why," he added, curious in spite of himself, "did you bring a mannequin?" That was weirder than bringing a terribly unhappy alien with half a face, Annie.

"Because Five told us she was his girlfriend, and named her Dolores," Annie explained patiently, shrugging. "And I was trying to make a good impression on my eventual in-laws. We got her a manicure, 'cause she was only, like, a torso mannequin."

It didn't seem productive to try to keep offering optimism regarding the breakup thing, really, even if Annie was very tempted to point out that a death was different from a breakup. But, like, what did she know? Her only real ex was in rehab and she hadn't seen him -- by choice -- for years.

Deaths were different from breakups, yes, but he'd been talking about when the Zhaan who was here left without saying goodbye, not when his Zhaan had died. Because both were hurts that he'd learned to live with, eventually. For the most part.

"Did it work? Making a good impression?" Hopefully. Because that was really going above and beyond.

"I suppose, if you can take a mannequin, Summer can take me." He would tip better than Dolores, at least.

"I think Five appreciated it," Annie admitted, though it was kind of hard to tell with Five, of course. "But Diego's one of seven kids so my work's pretty cut out for me there, anyway."

Though she was...pretty sure they all liked her? His sisters were something of a question mark, at the moment. Particularly Vanya. (Maybe they had ended up in a time before Annie had decided to lock her up! That would be convenient.)

"And please, these people didn't bat an eye at Dolores," she added. "At all. I think I saw, like, a squid getting a massage when I was there. It's a space spa. They've seen it all."

"You're very easy to like. I'm sure they all like you." Maybe not Vanya but Stark didn't know about that whole incident.

"I just get nervous, about going strange places, sometimes. I stand out. And I've no idea what to even expect."

Nobody have ever even introduced Stark to the joy of bubble baths, let alone spa treatments. He was going to be quite lost.

"Are you okay with strangers touching you?" Annie checked, actually seeing a potential red flag on the horizon there. "There'll be a lot of that. But it's...nice -- you can get a massage, or they'll paint your nails, or like, I got a facial last time that I swear helped my skin more than any of the stuff that actually comes out under my own brand, back home."

Yeah, Annie didn't actually use any Wish products because they tended to dry out her skin, which made her feel like a hypocrite? But that was one of those things she had just sort of...made peace with.

"I...I don't know," Stark admitted. If someone he didn't already know was touching him, historically that had meant nothing good. But a spa with his friends seemed a very unlikely place to be manhandled. "It doesn't happen, really. I could be. I'm not sure."

He hadn't had so much as a hug in nearly 3 weeks now, unless clinging to Grogu one morning counted. A massage might be overwhelming.

"They're professionals," Annie offered with a little smile. Granted, Annie spent half her life dealing with strangers touching her, but that just meant she was pretty good at navigating how weird it could be. "But that's something to be aware of. Manicures and pedicures involve, like, holding your hand or foot. A massage is a little more...you know. Involved."

But also wooooooonderful.

Stark had spent a not inconsiderable amount of time being touched by strangers, or at least people who weren't friends himself. It had just been more hitting and holding down and less getting camera or stage ready.

"I'll find something to do there." He could probably really use a massage but he might not be able to relax enough to relax. "There must be something." Maybe there was a brochure aimed at very tense and nervous aliens.

There were also the fans. And after nearly a year, Annie was now pretty decent at differentiating fans who wanted an arm around her from the ones who wanted their hands a little lower, at least.

But no one at the space spa was like handsy or violent! So that was good.

"Well, if I end up tagging along," Annie contributed, because, like, she absolutely was going to try to if it didn't interfere with work, "maybe I can make some recommendations in the moment." And she would also insist on picking up the tab, so there was that, too.

Fans were not something Stark ever had to deal with, handsy or otherwise. That was unlikely to change.

"I'd like that," Stark said. He still wasn't smiling these days but his expression right now was the closest he'd come to it today.

Devil's Nest | Thursday Evening

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