#if canon isn't gonna make him fruitier i sure as hell will

[starpirateee]

hi! i'd love to see a continuation of the isekai spies au or the curt joins chimera au. love your work!! ❤️ 💜 💙

I will gladly give you a continuation of the spies isekai, that was a Lot of fun! Sorry this took such a long time to get out, btw, but in the meantime I was asked this:

So I'm going to cater for both, if that's alright!

The time travel idea stuck fast in Curt's mind. It sounded ridiculous on all fronts, but it was the only Hong that made sense. It seemed like they were in the wrong place, though they didn't seem to stand out any.

The real question was how they'd done it. How they'd managed to go from having it out for each other in the middle of the weapons museum, to being here, where it was apparently fine to be ambiguously flirting with the men at the bar.

For now, the idea of how they'd gotten there wasn't the most important point of the moment. He was drinking with the second man to ever try and pick him up, and all things considered, he was having a pretty good time.

For all intents and purposes, Ted was great. Curt just wished that this wasn't a one time thing— that maybe, he'd have another chance to be himself and to be a little free before he and Owen had to find a way back to where they'd come from.

"Does this not, I dunno, bother you at all?" He asked, leaning against the bar and ordering another round.

"What?"

"This. Seeing someone once, talking like this, and then never seeing em again?" It had never bothered him before, but his dealings were strictly professional and never meant anything.

Ted raised an eyebrow. "You think I'd have asked you out if I didn't think you'd be a one off? You're not the first, man, and I'm pretty sure you won't be the last..."

Curt frowned, his brow creasing as he took a sip of his drink. Ted noticed his expression and shot him an amused glance. "What? That bother you?"

"More than it does you, apparently... It just feels— weird..."

"Oh, you're the type who ain't shy for commitment... You with someone?"

Curt hesitated. In the most literal sense of the word, he was with someone. He'd arrived with Owen, and he was still here. But in that specific sense that Ted was asking about, he wasn't with Owen anymore. Hadn't been for years...

"No, but I was..."

"How long?"

"Five and a half years... Something like that."

"Jeez, not bad..." if he had to guess, he'd have said Ted genuinely looked impressed. He'd leaned forwards a little, and his eyes had went wide. "Special type?"

"Yeah, for ages he was the only one." And it was both dangerous and a comfort to remember Owen as he used to be. All those late nights on the floors of cheap motel rooms, all the uttered words they'd only ever whisper to each other... That was sacred. "But, y'know, those things aren't meant to last."

Ted held his glass out in toast to that. "Hear that, pal. What was his name?"

"Owen."

"Ehh, fuck Owen." Ted had uttered that so confidently that Curt almost choked on the drink he was taking. He laughed, taken completely off guard, and even Ted chuckled. "No, I'm serious! You want commitment outta life, I'm sure you won't have any trouble in finding someone, nice guy like yourself."

"... Thanks," Curt smiled as he felt his face heat up, ready to blame it on the heat of the room. "What about you?"

Ted huffed a breath of laughter. "Yeah, that kinda life's not on the cards for me. Got myself a bit of a reputation, y'know?"

The conversation spanned for a while. Curt really started to let himself go, but kept himself in that balance of opening up and revealing more than necessary, out of a force of habit. Eventually, he and Ted parted ways— Curt was implicitly told that it should feel amazing to walk off a conversation with a guy's personal phone number— and he immediately found Owen again. After all, there was a lot to catch up on. Owen was a familiar face in a sea of strangers, and he'd been the one to propose that they stay by each others' sides.

Needless to say, Owen didn't look impressed when Curt found him. It wasn't like he'd caught any of the conversation, but it had been one hell of one, and that desperation was not a facade that was easy to keep hold of. Trying to act like he was upset about Curt supposedly "standing him up" was way too beyond him.

He had finished Curt's pint too. Frankly, he needed it. And Curt didn't look too offended, so it was no more than terrible American beer under the bridge. The two of them left the bar after, not a word between them until they were a good distance from the premises. Then he turned to look at Curt, half curious and half bitter. "So, how was he?"

Part of him genuinely wanted to know what that kinda of freedom felt like. What it was like to get that close in a room full of people who didn't think twice. The other part of him had seen past all that and just hoped that leaving him hanging for all that time was worth it.

Curt's eyebrows quirked. "Ted? He was great. Real nice guy. Why? That bother you or something?" He shoved his hand in his pocket, feeling the coaster on which Ted had written his number. Quite the unorthodox method, he had to admit, by quite charming all the same.

"Bother me? What do you think I am, twelve years old?"

"Jealous that I could pull before you?"

Yes. Partially. Those words would never leave him, but he thought it nonetheless. "Sod off, my god, you're a child."

Curt smirked. "Anyway, since that's clearly getting to you, I— uh, got what you wanted."

"What, you found out where we are?"

"Yeah. We're on some island in lake Michigan. Hatchetfield." He felt himself absently crease the corner of the coaster, and removed his hand from his pocket quickly.

Owen hummed. "We weren't in the states when we started this, we were in the middle of fucking Europe. How the hell did this happen?"

"That's the part I don't know. Y'see, I think we're gonna have to check the date, too."

"Why's that?"

"Ted called my Bel Air "vintage"."

"Hold on, what?" Owen stopped in his tracks and thought that over. "But you've had that thing from new, and that was only a few years ago..." His eyes went wide. "Oh lord, we have to find a newspaper."

Luckily, that wasn't a hard thing to acquire. Owen dipped into one corner store, and came out with a newspaper folded under his arm. He and Curt opened it together, and his eyes immediately landed on the topmost header.

"Oh my god..."

Judging by that reaction, Curt had seen it too. They exchanged a glance, letting their shock speak for itself, and then glanced back at the paper to make sure they were seeing the same thing.

"Owen, am I reading that right?"

"I think you are, Curt. I.... Think you are." 1962 was no more. Owen had to put his jealousy aside for a moment, because he realised that things were truer than he thought when he said Curt was the only person he had as a cornerstone.

The two of them would have to put their differences aside too, even for a little while, because the truth of the matter was plain. Curt's car was vintage. Men must be allowed to get with other men. Constant economical changes meant it was probably normal for beer to be that price.

The date was June 7th, 2019.

The two of them were stranded in the States, some near sixty years from the time they knew.