#Hermann learned to keep snacks in his room from then on | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

pinnithin-writes · 3 years

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more of a feeling

Mission to Zyxx fic, mild spoilers for season 5 if you're not caught up. This started as rambling about our bodies sabotaging us and turned into a conversation about our bodies taking care of us. 2117 words.

It was simple, really. It all came down to chemistry.

C-53 knew how emotions worked, of course; he’d even go so far as to call himself a veteran by now. Every frame he’d inhabited was a different experience, but the emotions he felt in those frames were a reassuring constant. He knew the programming for joy. He could trace the source code for anger. His cube felt it all the same, and no matter how many diagnostics he had to run in an unfamiliar body, his thoughts, his feelings, and his personality grounded him through the flux.

Until, that is, the failed clone of a scientist shoved him in a meat suit without his consent.

Emotions were different when he was piloting flesh. They governed his body more than he was used to. They still generated from C-53’s cube, but now that cube was hooked up to nerves and synapses, blood and organs, and those living, breathing parts responded accordingly. He was a miracle of a machine, truly – a code given life – but he couldn’t wax poetic about something like that when his pores leaked and his muscles tired and his stomach twisted in knots.

It was hard enough dealing with a body that resisted his will at every turn. It was worse still that every fleeting feeling affected him on the molecular level. He didn’t know how organics got anything done like this. Frustration made his head pound and his guts churn. Despair burned his eyes and locked his throat. Even pleasant feelings – affection, mirth – stole his breath, made his pulse race. It was distracting at best and debilitating at worst. Surely there was a way to bypass these effects.

Unable to connect his consciousness to high speed internet, he had to go about this the old fashioned way, which made it a slow process indeed. Thankfully, the USS Synergy owned a vast library, which he took advantage of to scan every file they had on hermanns, discovering himself.

He did most of his research at night. He told himself this was because he was less likely to be interrupted, but in truth he was embarrassed at his own inefficiency. Even in the old loader frame, downloading the data would have taken all of ten seconds. And though he knew his crewmates wouldn’t humiliate him, he still didn’t want to be seen like this. Having to move his eyes across a screen, absorb and process the words they scanned, and then file that information away in his slippery maze of a brain, line after line after line after line after line.

The hours of learning made him feel childish. C-53 was tired.

But he was getting somewhere. When exhaustion pulled at his eyelids and his thoughts went fuzzy in the late, still hours on Bargie, he knew it was adenosine flooding his neural pathways and inhibiting his functionality. No code existed to override adenosine. Caffeine, however, could counteract it for a short time (with the unfortunate side effect of upsetting his stomach and tasting like tar).

C-53 pored over chemistry texts and neuroscience studies, learning what made hermanns - and thus, hermanoids - do what they did. There were no comparable texts on tellurians in this galaxy, but the science, from what he could remember, was quite similar. It was all chemicals, and those chemicals told his brain to tell his body how to act.

It was exceptionally overcomplicated. There was always some other influencing factor to his body, a sensory input or a thought or even his DNA - Jeremy’s genetic memory - that scrambled a system that could theoretically be very streamlined.

An example: he could eat something that tasted good (peanut butter and chocolate), triggering a flood of dopamine that caused him to feel happy. But Jeremy was allergic to tree nuts, so his immune system attacks him for a perceived threat that doesn’t exist, so forcefully that he could die from it. It was as fascinating as it was annoying. Who knew organics could have glitches? Too bad he hadn’t figured out how to debug anaphylactic shock.

He didn’t know what he hoped to accomplish by doing all this research. In a way, studying why his body actively sabotaged him was a comfort, but the more he learned, the more faults he discovered. Evolution was a temperamental thing. He much preferred the elegance of engineering.

At present, it was a dark hour on Bargie, docked and slumbering with her crew on the Synergy. Half awake in the conversation pit, amidst a tangle of textbooks and portable screens, C-53 sat alone under the red glow of the security lights. Sprawled as he was, C-53 didn’t immediately notice Pleck wandering into the room until he said his name.

Blurry lines of text sharpened as he startled, then relaxed. “Hm? Oh, hey Pleck,” he said.

“C-53, it’s like, three in the morning,” Pleck responded. Bare footsteps signaled his approach, and then he dropped onto the couch next to C-53, a glass of water in one hand and an orange fruit in the other. He reached over and set the glass precariously on the cushion between them. “Y’know, tellurians usually sleep around this time,” he pointed out helpfully. “What are you doing out here?”

The info tablet C-53 held was inches away from his face. “I’m learning about my pineal gland,” he announced dully.

A hormone regulator located near the brain stem. Releases melatonin and influences one’s circadian rhythm. Well, it wasn’t doing a very good job right now, was it?

“Cool, is that something like - do tellurians have that too or just, y’know,” Pleck drew his feet up to sit cross-legged, “whatever you are?”

C-53 couldn’t help but smirk mirthlessly at that. “It’s found in most vertebrates, so yes, I would imagine both you and whatever I am have one.” He set the tablet aside to look at Pleck, but the screen made him night blind, and he could only see the afterimage of a splotchy red rectangle in the darkness. “Why are you awake?”

“Oh, I woke up thirsty,” Pleck explained easily. He fiddled with the peel on his fruit as he spoke. “And then I thought, well, while I’m up I might as well grab a snack, and then I saw you sitting there so,” he shrugged, “here I am.”

It was a better explanation than what C-53 had. And it was a far better explanation than Pleck would have given several months ago, when the Allwheat was still worming into his brain and keeping him up at odd hours. C-53 was thankful those days were behind them. As the afterimage of the tablet faded and Pleck became a collection of grays and blues beside him, he quietly mourned the loss of his night vision. And his regular vision.

“You ever had one of these, C-53?” Pleck asked. He finally got his fingernails under the skin and began peeling. “The Themm grow these instead of oranges. They’re kind of sour?”

“I haven’t,” C-53 answered. He hadn’t eaten an orange before, for that matter, but he wasn’t too interested in expanding his food horizons. Most things had an unpleasant texture to him.

“Do you want some?” Pleck went on, adding pieces of rind to the small pile in his lap. He slanted C-53 a glance. “Oranges are the most shareable fruit.”

“No, thank you.”

Pleck shrugged again before separating a slice of not-orange and popping it in his mouth. As he chewed in silence, C-53 picked up the glass between them and placed it safely on the coffee table. Piles of nearby notes were scrawled in his own clumsy hand, amateur diagrams and chemical formulas with lots of arrows and exclamation marks littering the margins. Writing it down helped the nonstick pan of his brain gain some traction, he found, but the coffee table was starting to look like Nermut’s conspiracy wall after so many hours of research.

His neck ached. His head pounded out a protest.

He’d been pushing his brain and body to its limits and had what to show for it? A newfound disgust with himself? A frustration he only knew more intimately? C-53 frowned and used one of his papers as a coaster.

Beside him, Pleck happily ate his fruit, unbothered. Being organic was easy for him; he was a native to his body and didn’t know anything else. C-53 pitied and envied him in equal measure.

“You’re going to bed soon, right C-53?” Pleck asked after making his way through half the orange. He reached to retrieve his glass from the table, but condensation stuck a note about the amygdala to the bottom. “Oh,” he remarked.

C-53 peeled it off for him. “I don’t like sleeping,” he explained, crumpling the note and tossing it on the table. “So I’m reading.”

Pleck took a sip of water and frowned. “You gotta sleep sometime.”

“I know,” he answered shortly. He’d read dozens of articles about the side effects of sleeplessness. Fatigue, irritability, memory issues, hallucinations if you waited long enough. He knew he’d crash eventually, he just wasn’t especially motivated to avoid it. “It feels bad,” he went on. “Waking up is disorienting.”

There was a thoughtful crease between Pleck’s brows; C-53 could barely see it under the security lights. Pleck took a moment to set his glass back down on the table before turning the remainder of the fruit over in his hands. “Is it because you don’t feel safe?” he asked without looking up.

“I’m… sorry?”

“It’s just - y’know, when I was having trouble sleeping-”

“Pleck, I’m not a lunatic,” C-53 interrupted. “I know I’m perfectly safe on Bargie. I just don’t like sleeping. I don’t need you to teach me how to be tellurian, okay?” He gestured at the pathetic mess of research before him, scrawled in an obvious lunatic’s hand. “I’m figuring it out.”

Pleck fed himself a section of orange and didn’t answer right away. On C-53’s other side, the info tablet’s screen auto timed out and went dark. They were bathed in red completely now, one of them frustrated and exhausted, the other watchful and concerned. C-53 removed his glasses and rubbed at his stinging eyes.

“Sorry,” he said after a time. “I’m just…”

“Tired?” Pleck offered.

C-53’s sigh went through his whole body. “Yes.”

A stubborn, senseless part of him didn’t want to overcome this. He didn’t want to be an example of perseverance, some epic struggle conquered by learning to live well. He wanted to kick and bite and throw a fit over this new frame. It wasn’t fair.

“C-53,” Pleck broke quietly into his thoughts. “You don’t have to, y’know, have the answer to everything all the time. Sometimes you have to just… do what your body is telling you to do, even if you don’t want to.” He offered an orange slice in C-53’s direction. “It’s trying to take care of you.”

“You say that like this flesh suit has a soul,” C-53 grumbled, but he took the fruit anyway, staring glumly as it lay in his stupid, sweaty palm.

“Well, sure it does.” Pleck smiled and prodded his shoulder with an index finger. “It’s you.”

C-53 fell silent. It was strange, learning things from Pleck. He was used to the roles being reversed, and it shifted something uncomfortably inside him every time it happened. Dutifully, he put the orange in his mouth, felt the tart flavor burst on his tongue, and chewed past the slimy sensation until he was able to swallow it. He was unable to hide a shudder.

Pleck watched him with one hopeful eye. “Not your favorite?” he guessed.

“It’s the texture,” C-53 explained, grimacing. But he held his hand out for another slice in spite of it.

Pleck grinned. “We can find something you like to eat instead of this,” he said, scooping the orange peels out of his lap and leaving them on the coffee table for later cleanup. “It doesn’t have to all be bad. Come on,” he rose from his seat and offered C-53 his hand. “Let’s check the kitchen for something better and then, y’know, maybe try and get some sleep?”

The please was unspoken, but C-53 could see it on Pleck’s freckled face. He was trying to take care of him, just like his clunky, unfamiliar body was. C-53 didn’t like his body very much, and wasn’t sure he ever would, but he liked Pleck enough to go along with him for now. He didn’t know what kind of chemical governed trust. He didn’t even let himself ask.

C-53 took Pleck’s hand, tried not to flinch from the zing it sent up his arm, and followed him out of the pit.

#mission to zyxx #mtz #pleck decksetter #c-53 #AI in a meat suit having an understandable problem with being Flesh #do you know how fuckin hard it was to walk this Jeremy line without letting it be rpf on accident #hhhhanyway #pleck/53 #(very minor)

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detectivejay-chuckles-halstead · 4 years

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30 Days // Jay Halstead x Reader // Pt 1:6

Description: 30 Drabbles of Jay and Reader’s life together

Words: 2122

Warnings: FLUFF (and a lot of it), NSFW Smut, Swearing

Pairings: Jay x Reader

A/N: Again, much needed fluff (for 6 parts)! Then back to our regularly scheduled angst. Picture by @infinityxpremades

1. Holding Hands

Being with Jay was a mixture of sexy and sweet, the man not often having a middle ground. Not that you were complaining, no. Just, some days you got what you weren’t expecting. This was one of them. Jay -- for once -- had a day off. And for once, Voight had given you the same day off. It was a miracle in itself. He hadn’t wanted to stay home, wanted to go out and do something.

“Experience life!” he’d exclaimed when trying to get you to agree.

As much as you wanted to just stay home with your boyfriend, his adorable smile got you to go with him. Lunch at the pier, walking along Millennium Park. It was the middle of April. Cold enough for a jacket, but not cold enough to be miserable. The two of you walked side by side, your hand in his. It was the small things that made you smile, not needing grand gestures. As long as you had Jay, you were the richest person in the world.

2. Cuddling Somewhere

Adam had invited the team over for dinner after a tough case, Jay insisting you come along with him. You’d really just wanted to go home, but figured it wouldn’t hurt to relax a bit. At first, it seemed like it took Intelligence a while to warm up to you despite Jay’s insistence that they all liked you. Until one day, Kim pulled you aside.

“It’s obvious Jay cares about you,” the woman had told you in a hushed tone. “Just...He’s had enough heartbreak for a lifetime. If you’re not in it for the long run, it’s best to just get out now.”

It was at that moment you understood it wasn’t that the team didn’t like you, it was that the team didn’t want to see Jay get hurt again. You’d learned all about Erin, Hailey. You understood, assuring them that you saw a future with Jay.

Adam’s place wasn’t the biggest, but it fit the six of you pretty well. Though, you and Jay had been booted to the floor. You weren’t complaining, sitting between his legs, back against his chest as his arms wrapped around you.

“Why are you two just so...sickeningly cute?” Adam asked, getting a laugh out of you. You’d felt bad that it hadn’t worked out between him and Kim, coming in right after they’d ended things for good. From what Jay had told you, they’d been good together. Until they weren’t.

“You’ll find someone, someday, Ruze, that will make you just as sweet,” Jay answered as you took a drink from the wine-glass you were holding. Vanessa smiled at you. It was nice to get to relax, even for just a few hours.

3. Watching a Movie

“What movie do you want to watch?” Jay asked from the living room as you poured the popcorn into a bowl. Beers were already on the coffee table, sprinkling just a little salt on the snack in your hands.

“I don’t know. You pick,” you insisted, hearing an exasperated huff. When you walked in, he was bent over your DVD collection, staring at the titles. Quietly, you set the popcorn down before walking over and smacking his ass, making him jump.

“Not fair,” he reminded you, glaring at you with a smirk before grabbing a DVD and popping it in the DVD player. The two of you got situated on the couch, feet propped up on the coffee table as you leaned into him. Jay fiddled with the DVD remote before the movie began playing.

“Really?” you asked, curling further into him as the logo for Saw came across the screen. “Don’t we see enough of this at work?”

“You told me to pick,” he reminded you, keeping his arm around your shoulders as you hid your face in his chest. He knew you didn’t like horror movies. With that knowledge, he probably chose it so that way he could keep you close.

4. On A Date

“You really didn’t have to do this,” you said again for the thousandth time as he drove into downtown Chicago. He’d told you he was taking you out on a date night, reminding you it had been nearly two months since the last time you’d both been available for one. It was hard since you were both on the same team, and recently it seemed like you were always working a case without a day off. You’d closed a case earlier in the day, nothing coming in before you left for the day.

“I know, but it’ll be fun. I promise.” He pulled up in front of Roka Akor, letting the valet take the car from there. You hooked your arm through his, leaning into him slightly as the two of you walked in. It wasn’t every day you were able to go to your favorite Japanese restaurant -- especially since it was usually saved for special occasions due to the price.

“You really didn’t have to do this,” you whispered to him as the host led you to a private table. The two of you sat down, Jay not saying anything. When you looked at him, he had a smile on his face, reaching across the table to hold your hand. You couldn’t ignore his foot brushing against your leg softly either.

“I know I didn’t, Y/N. But I am allowed to spoil my girlfriend occasionally,” he reminded you. You weren’t the type who expected to be spoiled, but you had to admit it was nice. You hadn’t had time to even look at the menu when both of your phones went off. “One night,” he sighed. “Can we just have one night?”

You pulled out your phone, seeing that Intelligence had managed to get a case. “How about we schedule a weekend off, Jay,” you suggested, seeing his face drop when he looked at his phone.

“Yeah,” he agreed, the two of you leaving. As you waited for the valet, he pulled you to him, lips against yours. You practically melted into him at the contact. “When we get home,” he said in a harsh whisper, kissing along your jaw. “I plan on making up for this.”

“I’ll hold you to it, Halstead,” you agreed, the valet clearing his throat to get your attention. You couldn’t look at the man as a blush formed across your cheeks at getting caught.

5. Making Out (NSFW)

Molly’s was packed -- more so than usual. Not that you minded. It gave you more of a reason to sit on the same side of the booth as Jay, leaving the other side open for whoever wanted it. Nobody was going to take it, though. You’d both had a few more drinks than usual by that point, having three rounds of shots in as well. Despite all the other people in the bar, it felt like you and Jay were the only ones there.

He’d hooked his arm around your waist, pulling you close as your hand held onto the back of his neck. Your lips were in a battle for dominance, your free hand resting high on his thigh. He made you feel like a teenager again, making out in the booth on a date. It was fun, exciting, not what you’d usually do.

“Do you guys want me to book you a motel room across the street?” Hermann asked. Jay pulled away from your lips, though that wasn’t going to stop you as you tasted the exposed skin of his neck.

“You got a backroom with no cameras?” Jay countered, Hermann looking disgusted as he grabbed the empty glasses off the table.

“If that means the patrons of my bar don’t have to watch you two act like a couple horny teenagers, then yeah. I do. Through the double doors. Knock yourselves out.” You giggled, getting out of the booth with Jay close behind.

The doors had barely swung shut when he pressed you against the wall, your leg hooking around his waist as your lips met again. You silently thanked God for the fact he’d worn a button-up, fingers working quickly to get his shirt open. As soon as his skin was exposed, you let your hands roam, earning a groan from him.

“I’m half tempted to just take you right here,” he half-growled when your eyes met. There was no denying the lust on his face, tongue darting out to lick his swollen lips as his eyes scanned your body. His pupils were blown, hiding the natural green of his eyes.

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” you teased, wanting...no, needing him. “Hermann did say there were no cameras.” His lips were on yours again, walking you to the counter, helping you up as he stood between your legs.

“Think Voight could get us out of an indecent exposure charge?” he asked as his lips found your neck, laughing at his question.

“I doubt.” You moaned as he sucked along your collarbone, eyes fluttering shut as you threw your head back to allow him better access. “That Hermann would press charges.”

He pulled back as your hands fumbled with his belt. Maybe you were just a bit more drunk than you’d originally thought, but that didn’t matter. The only thing you could possibly focus on in that moment was Jay, his hands dipping up under your shirt as he explored your skin. You managed to get his belt undone, popping the button on his jeans before his hands were reaching up under your dress. It was at this time, you knew you’d made the best decision when you’d decided to wear a dress.

He grabbed the waistband of your panties as you lifted your hips slightly, enabling him to slide them down your legs. They fell to your ankles as he ran his hand up the skin of your leg, your dress bunching up around his wrist as his lips found yours again. You pulled him closer, pushing down his jeans and boxers just enough to free him. He took no time to pull you to the edge of the counter, sheathing himself inside you quickly.

It sent a jolt of pleasure through you as you moaned into his mouth, nails digging into his shoulders. There was no hesitation as he set a fast pace, both of you knowing this wasn’t going to last very long. If you were being honest, you couldn’t remember the last time you and Jay had been intimate. Recently with work, it seemed like all you two were doing was just that...work.

“Oh, fuck, Y/N,” he groaned as he held onto your hip with bruising strength. You didn’t care, focused on the pleasure. The two of you knew you couldn’t be loud, not wanting to bring suspicion to the back room. As your orgasm swept over you, Jay capturing your lips again, one hand held onto him, the other trying to find purchase on the counter. This action sent a glass jar to the floor, shattering upon impact. It didn’t take long for Kidd to come looking for the source.

“Oh god!” she exclaimed, Jay barely noticing as you made eye contact. The other woman quickly covered her eyes. “I know Hermann said there were no cameras, but really?” she asked as she hurried out of the room.

You felt Jay smile, hips faltering in their pace as he reached his peak. You locked your legs around him, keeping him close as the two of you came down from your respective highs.

“We should probably go back out there,” you told him, hand stroking through his hair, nails gently scratching along his scalp as he let his head rest on your shoulder. “Have another drink, and head home?”

“Sounds like a good plan,” he agreed, trailing kisses along your shoulder for a few seconds longer before pulling back, getting his pants back up on his hips. You hopped off the counter, leaning down to grab your underwear. With a smirk, you shoved them in Jay’s pocket before sauntering out of the room, Jay on your heels.

Stella gave you a knowing look, returning her look with a coy smile. The two of you approached the bar, settling in the middle where you’d managed to find a seat. Jay remained standing right beside you, hand on your thigh.

“Another round of tequila shots,” you announced with a smile.

“Next time, I’m just getting you two a room across the street,” Hermann replied as he poured the shots. Seemed like either A) he knew what you two were up to or B) Stella told him what she saw. It didn’t matter either way, too high on Jay to really care.

#jay halstead #jay halstead imagine #jay halstead x reader #jay halstead smut #fanfiction

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hermannsthumb · 5 years

Note

If your'e still taking prompts the one from the halloween list: "we’re secret friends with benefits and you accidentally wore my shirt to to the party so you’re pretending you came as me and it turns out your impression of me is on point and you know me better than you know myself are you sure you’re not in love with me??" seems like such a good newmann one. love your writing :)

from list of halloween prompts here

this one is literally so fucking good for them. god. GOD. theres like the tiniest bit alluded to not sfw in the beginning (after the making out) but after that its fair game

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“Ngh,” Newt says. “Keep doing that.”

“Hmm?” Hermann says. He drags his mouth up from Newt’s collarbone, eyes dark, pupils wide, mouth curled into a lazy smile. Almost coquettish.

Newt blinks down at him blearily. And with a little poorly-concealed irritation. “I said keep doing that,” he says. “Not stop doing that.” He gives Hermann’s head a nudge. A tiny gentle one. He’s eager, he can’t help it; Hermann always gets him all eager and hot and bothered. He doesn’t think he’ll mind. “C’mon, baby, c’mon--”

It’s a mistake. Hermann minds: his demeanor changes in an instant, like Newt flipped a light switch that was clearly labeled with a do not touch! in masking tape and Sharpie. (Shit, Newt thinks.) “Don’t,” Hermann snaps, and swats at Newt. “You know I can’t stand it when you pull--”

“I’m not pulling your hair!” Newt says. He drops his hand away and holds it high above his own head just to make his point. “I swear. I was just trying--”

Hermann rolls off of him and onto his back, huffing, arms folding across his bare chest. Lacking any better ideas, Newt follows him. “Aw, Hermann,” he says, “don’t be like that.” He presses kisses to Hermann’s jaw, his chin, the corner of his mouth. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to--”

“Unhand me at once,” Hermann mumbles. Newt kisses his cheeks, his mouth. Hermann kisses back. His hand slides up to cup the back of Newt’s neck. “Wretched little man,” he continues to mumble. “Ah.”

“There we go, Hermann,” Newt says, grinning against his lips, and adds, sarcastically (because it always makes Hermann laugh), with a little nip of teeth, “There’s my Hermy-wermy.”

Hermann makes a face. “You know I can’t stand that either.”

“Really?” Newt murmurs. He tiptoes his hand down Hermann’s chest, down to the waistband of his ugly slacks, the open zipper; his grin spreads wider. “Because I think,” he starts to tug Hermann’s slacks down, “your hermy-wermy would say otherw--”

There’s a knock at the door.

Mood ruined, and all of Newt’s hard work getting Hermann game to go again ruined, too, Newt slides his hand back to safe territory and lets out a colorful stream of profanity. Hermann wrinkles his nose beneath him. Whatever, he curses just as much as Newt. “Fuck,” Newt finishes. “Who the hell is that?”

Hermann pushes him off and sits up with a grunt. “We’ve probably got a damned laboratory meeting we forgot about,” he says, “because someone couldn’t keep it in his Hot Topic skinny jeans long enough to wait until we clocked out for the night.”

“They’re not from Hot Topic,” Newt says. He pauses. “How do you even know what Hot Topic is, anyway?”

“I’ve seen the label on them,” Hermann says. There’s another knock. Hermann sighs, and makes to slip out of bed. “If you won’t get it, Newton, I will.”

Newt drags him back down quickly. “What are you doing?” he hisses. “Get back here! You are not answering my door looking like--” He plucks at the elastic of Hermann’s tighty-whiteys peeking out, pokes at the hickey purpling on his neck. “--this. Or at all, actually, how suspicious would that look? This is my bedroom.”

“We’re colleagues,” Hermann says with a sniff. “It’s perfectly natural for us to--er--consort. Outside of work. For all they know we’re talking about work.”

“In our underwear?” Newt says, and points out, “It’s not really natural for colleagues to screw each other as much as we do.”

Hermann flushes. “No one would be able to tell--”

To be completely honest, Newt really, really doesn’t care whether or not people know he and Hermann are--uh--rivals with benefits, but Hermann is always so weird about privacy, and Newt supposes it’s a little bit of a cliche to sleep with a co-worker, so he takes one for the team. “Jesus, Hermann, I’ll get the door,” he says. He swings his legs to the floor and does his jeans back up, then grabs the first shirt he can find and pulls that on too. “Just sit there and look pretty.”

Newt learns two things in the course of squeezing his head out the door and talking to a mildly intoxicated LOCCENT worker: one, that the guy was sent by Tendo to remind them about the super awesome spectacular Halloween party going on down the hallway right his second, and two, that Newt and Hermann were invited to this Halloween party, apparently agreed enthusiastically to coming to it a week ago, and if Newt doesn’t find Hermann and show up with him in ten minutes, Tendo is totally never speaking to them or inviting them to another awesome party ever again. Newt learns a third thing once he and Hermann toss on the rest of their clothing, smooth out their hair a little, and hurry down the hallway to where the party is being held within those allotted ten minutes: he’s accidentally put on Hermann’s shirt. A fourth: Hermann’s accidentally put on his.

Before Hermann can waltz in through the door and raise questions (because his buttons are straining obviously under his low-cut button-up sweatervest, kaiju blood stains a spot just under the lapel, and Newt’s swimming in Hermann’s sleeves and has got a fucking pocket protector in), Newt drags him off to the side and shoves him against a deserted wall to explain their predicament.

“We have to change,” Hermann declares immediately. “We can’t be seen--”

“No, look,” Newt says. He’s quickly formulating a plan. They won’t be able to swap pants, obviously, but-- “Take off your blazer and sweater.”

Hermann frowns. He tucks his blazer tighter around himself. “No,” he says.

“Take them off, jackass!” Newt orders, ripping his own tie off from around his head and starting to kick off his boots. “And your shoes. Look, it’s a Halloween party, right? People dress up for Halloween parties. Let’s just say we’re going as each other, everyone will get a huge kick out of it, no one finds out we’re, you know.” He adjusts his left index finger and thumb into a small circle, and pokes his right index finger through it a few times with bonus sound effects. “Rendezvousing. Platonically. Your public image is saved.”

“No,” Hermann repeats, though he flushes. “I am not wearing your disgusting boots.”

Patience running very, very thin, Newt corners him closer against the wall. Not very successfully: Hermann does, after all, have several inches on him. Newt has to glare up at him. “So help me God, Hermann,” he says through gritted teeth, “if you don’t give me your blazer right now, you can find some other horny bozo to--”

“Fine!” Hermann says quickly. He yanks the skinny tie from Newt’s hands. “If you spill anything on--”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

After a hurried exchange of accessories which leaves Newt looking like an exceptionally short and baggy Hermann, and Hermann like Newt if he wore contacts and enjoyed attacking his hair with scissors, they waltz into the party together. Newt’s actually pretty pleased with how their costumes turned out, all things considered--Hermann even consented to having Newt draw shitty approximations of his tattoos on Hermann’s arms with a marker they found in Hermann’s pocket.

Everyone at the party gets a total kick out of it, too, which is the best part--especially when Newt decides to toss in some quality Hermann Impressions.

“Newton,” he grumbles, poshly, hands on his hips, "quiet down right this instant.” That gets a few laughs. “You know I can’t stand it when you have fun.”

More laughs; Hermann, nursing a drink, looks only the vaguest bit amused. “Very funny,” he says. “My turn, now.” He shrinks in on himself in a way that makes him look just a bit shorter, and clears his throat: the voice that comes out next is so high-pitched, so scratchy, so fast, so--uncomfortably Newt that Newt nearly drops his own drink in shock. Especially once Hermann tosses in equally uncomfortably Newt hand gestures. “I’m going to do something ill-advised and dangerous to prove I’m right and give Hermann a stroke,” he declares. “Don’t you just love kaiju? They’re so cool.”

“I’ve never said I loved kaiju,” Newt says, but he’s grinning.

“They’re so cool,” Hermann repeats. “Do you like my tattoos? You know I have a Doctor Who one on my--?”

“Dude!” Newt hisses. He was eighteen, okay? Anyway, that’s not the kind of private, personal information that Hermann should be sharing if he wants to even remotely pretend they don’t get up to hijinks in the lab after hours.

“Dude!” Hermann echoes, perfectly.

The little crowd of their co-workers laugh. (Louder laughs than any of Newt’s impressions got.) Newt laughs, too, despite his embarrassment. And despite something beyond embarrassment, something he can’t quite put his finger on--it’s making his heart race, his palms sweat. Hermann sure must, well, know him to get him down like that, obvious comical exaggeration aside. (Or maybe it’s just because Newt talks a lot.)

“Ha, ha,” Newt says. “Okay, you win.”

“Thanks, dude,” Hermann squeaks in his Newt-voice. He winks.

Newt corners him at the snack table crammed into the far back of the room later, while Hermann is--innocently--scooping some bat-shaped pretzels onto a plate with a large plastic spoon. Newt makes his presence known by stealing a handful and swallowing down half of them. “Gotta say, dude,” he teases, “I’m a good look on you.”

“Of course you’d think that, you narcissist,” Hermann says, but he’s smiling. He swipes a few pretzels back. “Get your own. The bowl is right there.”

Newt steals another from Hermann’s plate. “It’s a crying shame you didn’t borrow my jeans, too,” he says. “I bet you could rock ‘em.”

“Mm, I highly doubt that.”

“You absolutely could,” Newt says. He glances around to make sure no one’s looking, and quickly darts his hand out to pinch Hermann’s ass. Hermann drops the spoon back into the pretzel bowl in surprise. “Though I guess there’s not much to fill them out--”

“You’re a wretched little man,” Hermann says, for the second time that day. The guy really needs some new insults.

“Your voice was really fucking good, by the way,” Newt says, casually, as they lurk in a different corner (lit up with a blacklight) a few minutes later. He’s finally gotten his own plate of food, though he keeps stealing from Hermann’s anyway. “Your Newt voice, I mean. And the--” He waves his hands around. “Do you practice it a lot?”

This pulls a snort from Hermann. “Don’t flatter yourself.”

“How’s it so good, then?” Newt pushes, and Hermann shifts, clearly uncomfortable.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he says. “I suppose I just--pay attention to you.”

Newt cracks a grin, and bumps his elbow against Hermann’s side. “I would kinda hope so.”

“Not like--” Hermann sighs; Newt shuts up fast. (Hermann’s moments of emotional candidness are very, very rare: the most he’s ever done after a fun romp in the sack, beyond leaving immediately, is pat Newt’s hand and say thank you, Newton.) “What I mean to say is that I am...fond of you. Fonder than I am of anyone else. And I watch you, occasionally, because I am fond of you, and notice small things about you--your speech patterns, how you carry yourself...”

That’s, well--it’s certainly candid, and unexpected, and good, of course, to know that Hermann like-likes him, but it’s also a little-- “That’s kinda creepy, Hermann,” Newt says. “You watch me?”

“That’s not--” Hermann stammers, and it turns into a quiet groan. “Oh, I’ve fouled this up. Newton--”

Newt saves him by stretching up on his tiptoes and planting a firm kiss on his mouth. Completely chaste. Devoid of any dirty intentions, like all of their previous kisses have been, like what they’re used to. Just a simple little kiss. It takes Hermann aback: Newt can feel him freeze up before he returns it tentatively.

It’s over in seconds. Newt pulls back and pats Hermann’s cheek. “I know what you mean,” he says. “I feel exactly the same way.” Then his grin returns. “I mean, I don’t watch you like a creep or anything--”

“Shut up,” Hermann says, pink-faced and very pleased.

#newmann #maria's fanfiction tag #Anonymous

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