mehehehe.....piarles + 25 or 45 🫶
25 = Green Card Marriage
45 = Vampire and Hunter
hehehehehehehe... let's see about 25 and 45 🤭👀
"It's brilliant, Charlito!" Pierre insists, spreading his arms like he's saying, come on. "I'm a hunter, so I'm allowed to settle in any country I want. If you're married to me, you'll be allowed to settle there too, and you can get that position at Rutgers like you have always wanted."
Charles folds his arms. "I'm a vampire, Pierre," he reminds him, pointedly. "Or have you forgotten?"
Pierre folds his arms, too, mirroring Charles' own pose. "Of course I haven't forgotten, calamar."
Calamar. As always, the nickname takes Charles right back - to that day in the back of his parents' garden, when Pierre had decided to come over for a surprise visit and he'd found Charles. Drinking. It had only been from a blood bag, of course (Charles would never kill a person, and he'd been too young then to know about charming someone to let him drink just a few sips) but it had still been more than enough for Pierre to understand what was going on. Pierre had frozen where he stood, eyes blown wide.
And Charles had thought, no no no, and he'd thrown himself at Pierre before he could think better of it. "Please don't leave, Pierrot, please, I promise I'm not evil and we're not evil, I don't care what they say on the news because it's not true, we don't hurt people, we don't hurt anyone, just... please don't go. You're my best friend, please -"
Pierre had stopped him there, putting a gentle hand over Charles' mouth. "I don't care that you're a vampire, Charles," he'd said with surprising firmness for a ten-year-old. "You're my best friend too. And, anyway, you're less of scary vampire and more like... a clingy little squid."
"I'm not!" Charles had shrieked, but of course Pierre had taken to calling him that every day from that moment on. (Charles never protested too much, because the nickname always felt like Pierre's way of saying I know what you are and you're my best friend anyway; I'm not going anywhere.)
"... Charles? Earth to Charles?" Pierre is asking, waving his hand in front of Charles' face. "Ah. Hello again. Did you go to vampire-planet?"
"You know we're from the same planet as you," Charles says immediately, rolling his eyes. "Or didn't they teach you that at hunter school?"
"Mmm, no, I think I skipped that module," Pierre says, and then he grins cheekily, tongue between his teeth.
Charles swats at him, and Pierre catches his wrist easily, his Hunter-trained reflexes quick as ever. Charles' breath catches.
It shouldn't be hot. It should be the opposite of hot, for fuck's sake - those kinds of reflexes are trained to kill people like Charles.
Except, Pierre didn't become a hunter to kill vampires. No - he did it for Charles. Not to hunt him, but to learn how to protect him from other hunters.
So, yeah. It's seriously hot when Pierre shows off some of those skills of his.
"Are you going to let go of me?" Charles asks, swallowing thickly. He can't help the way his gaze flickers to Pierre's fingers wrapped around his wrist, still holding him tightly in place.
You could hold me like that any time you want, Charles thinks, and fights against his blush. It shouldn't even be possible for vampires to blush, for fuck's sake, but Pierre manages to get Charles to do it anyway.
Pierre, thankfully, seems oblivious to Charles' spiralling thoughts. He winks at Charles, playful and cheeky as he always is. "Nope," he says, popping the p. "Not until you agree that my idea is brilliant."
And, right. Right. Charles had almost forgotten the reason why they're even here - Pierre's stupid, hair-brained scheme to get Charles his dream job at Rutgers.
Rutgers, which still does not allow any supernaturals onto its teaching staff, let alone Monégasque vampires.
"It's a terrible idea," Charles says flatly. "They'll never let me teach there if they suspect I'm a vampire."
"But if you're married to a hunter, nobody will ever suspect you're a vampire," Pierre points out, triumphantly. "See? It's genius."
Charles has to admit that it's... clever. Absolutely insane, yes, but clever.
Pierre must be able to read it on his face, because his eyes light up like his favourite F1 team has just won a race. "See! You do think it'll work!" he crows.
"I don't think -" Charles tries, but Pierre cuts him off with a dramatic sigh.
"I've done all the research, Cha. Trust me, there's no way that this can go wrong."
There is, Charles thinks, only a little despairingly. It's not so much that he's worried about getting caught - no, Charles is pretty good at charming officers by now. Half of the time, he doesn't even have to use his hypnotism.
What he's far more worried about is the fact that he'll be married. To Pierre.
Pierre, who he's only been in love with since the first time he called Charles "calamar" and stayed when anyone else would have left.
Pierre, who Charles knows would taste sweeter than anyone else in the world. Because that's the thing about being a vampire and being in love with someone: even one tiny sip of their blood will sustain you sixteen times longer than a random person's would.
It's bad enough just like this, when they're just friends, and Pierre throws his head back to laugh or slides his arm around Charles' waist, and Charles has to fight with himself to keep his fangs tucked away - because even though Pierre is so close and smells so good, he is not Charles' to taste or Charles' to have.
It's hard enough to hold himself back when they're just friends. Charles has no idea how the hell he'll be able to do it if they're fucking married.
But as always when Pierre suggests a hare-brained scheme, Charles is helpless in the face of his sparkling blue eyes and half-cheeky, half-pleading smile.
"Okay, calamar," he agrees, and even though he might just have signed the warrant for his own death-by-slow-torture-of-wanting-his-best-friend-too-much, it's worth it a thousand times over for the way Pierre beams at him and uses the wrist he's still holding to tug Charles into a tight hug.
"Rutgers, here we come!"
(50 Romance Prompts Ask Meme)
47 notes
·
View notes
Family Dinners - dpxdc
"Holy shit, you're Bruce Wayne!" Danny gaped, jabbing a finger at the man sitting at the head of the table.
The bustling dining room goes silent as everyone turns to look at him.
"Danny, who did you think was going to be here?" Tim asks, disbelief plain in his voice and Danny feels his face flush red.
"Sorry, I, uh, I guess I just never put it together. Tim Drake-Wayne. Wayne Manor. It, uh, makes sense now." He laughs sheepishly and scrubs at his neck before slumping back down into his chair.
"Well," Tim says with an indulgent sigh, "at least I know you're not just friends with me for my connections."
"Yeah, I'm really sorry, I just never thought about it, I guess."
Danny sinks lower as everyone around him laughs. Come to dinner, he said, the food is the best, he said, ignore the family, he said. Danny really wishes he'd listened to Tim and just ignored them—almost as much as he's regretting accepting the offer in the first place—but... he's having dinner with Batman.
Ancients, that's so weird!
The last time he saw Batman was in the future and, suffice it to say, it was not going well. There hadn't really been time for family dinners there.
Wait. Family dinners?
He peers around the table, openly gawking at everyone as it all clicks into place.
"Everything alright, Danny? Now realising who everyone else is?" Tim asks with a roll of his eyes.
"Uh... something like that..." Danny mumbles as everyone laughs again.
From further down the table, the smallest Wayne scoffs and clicks his tongue.
"I thought you said he was smart, Drake?"
"So, you all do it, too, then?" he asks, ignoring the jibe. Danny's only a little bit jealous as he thinks of how much easier they must have it, how much easier it'd be if his family had been on his side, too. "You all work together?"
"Nah," Dick says from across the table with a brilliant grin. "Tim's the only one that works with Bruce, we all have different jobs. I'm a police officer in Bludhaven."
"Disgusting." Danny blurts out without thinking—because seriously, what kind of self-respecting vigilante would also be a police officer?—before clapping a hand over his mouth. "Sorry."
The whole table laughs again, the loudest being the blonde girl a few spaces down from Dick. Look, Danny wasn't really paying attention to names when they were all paraded in front of him. Dick only gets remembered because his name is a joke.
Come on, Danny, recover!
"That's, uh, not what I meant, though."
"Oh?" Dick asks, cocking his head slightly to the side. Is it Danny's imagination or does his smile tense slightly?
"Yeah, I mean like, you know, in costume. It must make it so much easier to have everyone together like this."
"Costume? What do you mean?"
Yeah, Danny's not imagining it, everyone tenses up at that. It's really only now that he's realising that this probably isn't how he should bring up that he knows about their... night time activities. In fact, he probably shouldn't be bringing it up at all.
"Uuhhh..." Danny looks wildly around the table as he continues making his stupid noise. Think, think, think! There must be a way out of this!
"Danny?" Tim asks, looking concerned.
"Oh, Ancients, this isn't how I wanted it to go at all," he mutters, slipping even further into his chair. He's almost on the floor now and he so, so wishes it could just swallow him up.
His real first meeting with Batman was meant to be cool! He had planned to be Phantom, maybe save them from a tight spot, prove his worth as a mysterious and powerful ally as thanks for the help Batman gave him in the future.
"Danny, what are you talking about?" Tim starts tugging on his sleeve in an attempt to pull him back up from his pit of despair.
Eventually, Danny relents and sits up straighter, hiding his face in his hands and whining all the while.
"I'm sorry, I just didn't expect him to be here and it threw me off so now I look stupid and it's so embarrassing!" he wails, flailing his arms wide. "Why wouldn't you warn me that Batman was your adopted dad, Tim? Couldn't you have let me know?"
"I'm sorry, what? Danny are you alright? There's no way Bruce can be Batman, look at him!"
"Yeah," the blonde girl laughs from the bottom of the table, "look at him! That's a wet noodle of a man! Batman can actually do things, B is incapable of pretty much everything."
"Thank you, Stephanie," Bruce sighs, massaging his forehead.
It's... Those are the first words Danny's heard Batman say since everything went down and it's enough to knock him out of his embarrassment.
It's really good to hear his voice again. Especially now, when it's strong and healthy and full of personality—even if that personality is little more than a tired father right now—far better than how it had been, at the end.
Danny sits up, back straight, and grins. He's got this. He remembers it perfectly. Some people count sheep to fall asleep, Danny repeats his mantra to be certain that he'll never forget it.
"Gamma alpha upsilon tau iota mu epsilon, 42, 63, 28, 1 colon 65 dash 9."
Once again, the whole table falls into silence.
"Holy shit..." breathes the other D name (Duke? Danny's pretty sure he's Signal) from opposite Stephanie. "Isn't that...?"
"The time travelling code." The littlest Wayne says stiffly. "We have met in the future?"
"That's not just the time travelling code, Dami." Dick says, looking between Danny and Bruce. "That's the family time travelling code."
Danny's grin freezes in place.
"I'm sorry, what?"
"1 colon 65 dash 9." Dick explains, still flicking between him and Bruce. "It means you've been adopted into the family and we should all treat you as such, no questions asked."
"Tell you what, I'm about to ask a question." Danny says, dumbstruck. "You just told me it was a code to identify time travellers, not anything about being adopted! What the hell, B?"
Bruce looks about as shellshocked as Danny feels.
"We must have been close," he says finally, after opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water a few times.
"No! Not that close!" Danny reels back, taking a deep breath ready to refute it all, but... "Well, I mean, you found me when I first got stuck, and you helped me get better despite being... And then we fought together against the, uh, bad guy, before he, um, he... before you couldn't."
An uncomfortable beat passes while they all pick up on what Danny tried so hard not to say.
"So, you're not from the future, then, you travelled there and came back?" Tim asks, breaking the tension and leaning forward with a glint in his eye.
"Yeah, it was a whole end of the world thing, but don't worry about it," Danny says with a hand wave, "It's all kosher now, won't ever happen."
"What did happen?"
"Seriously, don't worry about it, we cool."
"How long in the future was it?"
"About ten years? You were pretty spry for an old man, B," Danny laughs, wishing they'd get off the topic of what happened and get back to the adoption bit.
Everyone shares degrees of a cautious smile as they relax out of the shock, and Dick—whose grin is the biggest—says, "No wonder you got the family code, you're already riffing on him like one of us. How long were you there for?"
"A week, before I managed to get back to my present and stop him then."
"A week? Jeez, B, that has to set some kind of record, seriously."
"Oh!" Danny says, sitting bolt upright and blinking in surprise before pointing at Dick and bouncing in his seat. "You're Nightwing!"
"What?"
"That's exactly what Nightwing said when Batman told me the code! Makes so much more sense now."
Dick laughs and claps his hands, delighted.
"You were not formally adopted?" The grumpy small one—Dami?—asks, his face pinched.
"I didn't even know I was informally adopted."
"And your parents? Are they alive or dead?"
"Damian, stop—"
"They were dead in the future, but they're alive now." Danny says, looking down. He fiddles with the tablecloth, twisting the fabric around his fingers as he fights down the pang of sadness that he always feels when he thinks of them now. He forces a bright smile on his face and hopes it doesn’t look too strained. "I just, uh, can't talk to them much, anymore."
"Damian," Dick warns, "1 colon 65 dash 9. Treat them as family, no questions asked."
"This is Damian treating him as family, the little turd has no manners." Tim scoffs, rolling his eyes, but he gently bumps shoulders with Danny to knock him out of his funk. Danny can't help but send him a watery smile.
"I have the most exemplary manners, Drake, unlike some people." Damian spits, crossing his arms with a pout. "I was merely ascertaining his status to see how he could possibly fit into the family."
"I know this is all a bit sudden, Danny," Bruce smiles, ignoring Damian and reaching out to lay a warm hand on his arm, "for all of us. But if I felt strongly enough to give you that code after spending a week with you in the future, then you are more than welcome in this family, if you so choose it. I think I can speak for all of us when I say we'd like to get to know you a bit more."
"I know a threat when I hear it, Bruce." Danny snorts. "But, yeah, I get it. I'm sorry this is all so weird, it really wasn't how I wanted to find you again, but... I'm glad I did."
"So are we, Danny." Dick says, with a warm smile. "And formally or not, 1 colon 65 dash 9 means you're family. Welcome to the fun house! No take backs or refunds, sorry. You're stuck with us."
7K notes
·
View notes