Travel hopefully in life.

chocolateboxcomm

“Seriously, David?” Alexis rolled her eyes and reached up with both hands to tuck the few stray curls that had fallen loose from her artfully messy bun back behind her ears. “According to our travel itinerary, we’re supposed to be on the road by nine o’clock at the latest.” She took a breath like she was about to lay into him further and then peered over Stevie’s shoulder and froze. “I’m sorry. Um. Are you doubling up your business suits in one garment bag?”

“No,” Stevie said, affronted, and Alexis breathed a sigh of relief. Stevie gestured to the three remaining sets of coordinating jackets and slacks laid out across the table and added, “I was hoping to get all five in there.”

Alexis’s green eyes went wide under her furrowed brow, mouth pulling down at the corners. She glanced over at David—who raised his eyebrows high and smug, as if his point had just been proven for him—and bared her teeth in a grimace.

“Okay,” she said, putting a gentle hand on Stevie’s shoulder and guiding her backwards, “yeah. No. Just, here, babe, let me. We’re not putting five suits in a single garment bag, okay?”

“You think you’re real cute,” Faraday muttered into the wet heat of Vasquez’s mouth, and swallowed down the answering chuckle.

He sank his teeth gently into the pulp of Vasquez’s lower lip, mouth curling at the corners when the other man caught a moan in the back of his throat and opened up for him. There wasn’t time for much more than this — the slick, sweet slide of Vasquez’s tongue curling against his own — but Faraday was greedy enough for this strange, tender intimacy that had sprung up between them to take what he could get and covet it until such time as he could glut himself anew.

“Trading goddamn favors like maidens in a fairytale.”

unconventionalcourtship

“Will,” Dr. Lecter breathed, eyes wide over his bloody mouth. It was a small comfort that he looked just as surprised to find Will standing here before him as Will was, himself. Dr. Lecter’s neatly coiffed hair had fallen into his face and there was a split at the bridge of his nose, another on his lip, already swollen, but beyond his general state of disarray he was the same man who had spent two weeks unravelling Will’s every defense and then abandoned him without a word.

“Dr. Lecter,” Will said, letting every miserable hour of wondering and wanting that had colored his days after Dr. Lecter’s sudden departure leech any warmth from his greeting.

“You two know each other?”

Will blinked. Just for a moment, he had forgotten there was anyone else around, which was exactly the unexpected reaction to Dr. Lecter’s presence that had drawn Will so deeply into his confidences all those years ago. He refused to fall into the same trap again. With some effort, he tore his gaze away from Dr. Lecter’s open, gobsmacked face, and tugged at the lapels of his jacket to give himself something to do with his hands that wasn’t crossing the room and adding another bruise to the collection the good doctor was already nursing.

“We’ve met,” Will confirmed, in a brusque clip.

eatdrinkmakemerry

“I think I must’ve been about sixteen the last time I did this,” Will grins. When Hannibal arches a curious eyebrow at him, he waves a hand at their surroundings and clarifies, “Lazing around in the woods, passing a bottle of liquor back and forth.”

Hannibal hums his understanding and tilts his face up toward the sun, closing his eyes and basking in the distant warmth. He can feel the heat of Will’s knee where it brushes his arm, too, picked out in stark counterpoint to the crisp air of early spring. “Shame that it’s been so long,” he laments, opening his eyes again when Will nudges his shoulder with the butt of the bottle. “We ought not let decades go by between this time and the next.”

“I could stand to make it a habit,” Will agrees, flashing the sweet, boyish grin that Hannibal favors for its unthinking sincerity. “Provided the company is always this good.”

Gaby frowns, “You’re cooking dinner for the cat?”

Napoleon wrinkles his nose. “The quality of the canned food at the grocery left something to be desired.”

Beside him, Illya nods, face somber and aggrieved.

“Remember what you said the other day?”

“No,” Faraday said, pointed.

“You told the whole saloon you were pregnant,” Vasquez provided helpfully.

(In which Faraday is affectionately taken to task for a slight misstep in his greater lingual education.)

Webster heaved a sigh and threw his head back to stare imploringly up at the ceiling of the tent with his hands splayed wide. “Why?” he groaned, scowling at the heavens. “Why can’t you let this go?”

“Why can’t you just tell me what you’re up to?” Joe shot back.

(Or: in which Webster really likes Robert Leckie and Liebgott really doesn’t.)

“Think you can stand for me?”

It seemed a peculiar question to Eugene’s feverishly wheeling mind, so he cracked an eye up at Shelton—who was frowning handsomely down at him, looking good enough to kiss despite his sweat-stained undershirt and dirt-streaked face, hair slightly matted from a few days’ lack of shower—and sighed exhaustedly, “Why?”

“Gotta get you down to the aid station,” Shelton explained. His hand was still resting possessively on Eugene’s back, his touch astonishingly tender against Eugene’s clammy, goose-pimpled skin. “Can’t have you dyin’ all alone in your rack a week before we ship outta this shithole for good, an’ that putain de docteur on duty got himself so busy with some inventory checklist he can’t be bothered with a house call.”

“Ain’t dyin’,” Eugene mumbled contrarily.

“Might could be,” Shelton shot back.

hc_bingo

scandalinbohemia

kunstarschloch

“It’s the curse of the gourmand, darling,” Blanche explained over the sudden swell of strings, lifting one shoulder in a lazy, feline shrug. “Every man who avails himself so thoroughly of the world’s great pleasures is destined to show the evidence of his passions, eventually. There’s no shame in it.”

Lew set his fork down on the edge of his plate—nearly empty, but for a couple of lingering pommes soufflée and one lonely tournedo swimming in truffle sauce—and lifted his napkin from the table, ducking his head and dabbing at his mouth as he gave himself another surreptitious once-over. Now that he was looking for it, he supposed he could admit that the fastenings on his vest were pulled slightly more taut than the especially attentive clotheshorse might allow, and his belt was cinched a little on the tight side of comfortable.

Author's Note: This was written as a part of the easycotroopers Rare Pair Meme for the lovely muccamukk , whose prompt was: “The fact that they hate each other just makes the sex better.”

This is probably less sexy and more sassy comic banter than you had in mind, but I hope you like it even so!

Extra special thanks to kunstarschloch and arwen88 for beta-reading and ensuring me it wasn’t a piece of out of character garbage, respectively. Y’all are the best and this would never have made it to posting without you! <33

Title is from Lorde’s “Biting Down,” which is also this piece’s unofficial theme song. All remaining errors are mine. Enjoy here, or read on AO3 if you prefer!