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kudzuoath · 1 year

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Needful Things

With the reappearance of symptoms foretelling of his arcane hunger, Gale seeks out the party’s paladin to plead his case. He needs help. Hopefully Odette is the kind of person he believes her to be.

Or, Gale and Odette experience mutual attraction and care. Neither one of them acknowledges it.

—

The party’s paladin was taciturn, and brutal on the field of battle. Not someone he typically would have felt drawn to. But then he watched the way Odette interacted with the tiefling children at the grove. Kindly. With a soft voice and a reassuring hand.

Or in the case of the little helion Mol, with a grin and a witty rejoinder that came to her lips as if it were second nature.

There were other things, too. The way she threw herself headlong into danger, flaming greatsword first, the moment she spotted someone in need. How she treated each battle like a game of lanceboard – or the way she carefully handled and collected the books they came across in their travels.

That last bit was the first thing he’d noticed actually – only someone who loved them the way he did would handle them with such care. Even the copies she set back down. It’s not what he expected from a warrior – though perhaps he was letting his biases get the better of him with that.

There was something about her. Under the blood and the bared teeth and the black tattoos covering her neck and forearms. A cleverness. A curiosity. And tying it all together, a surprising kindness.

So one evening in camp he approached her. She was sitting close to the fire, hunched over a tome they’d found in the ruined temple of Jergal.

“That looks like a fascinating read,” he said, unable to help himself.

Odette startled. She nearly took his leg out with her tail when it whipped back and forth. “What?”

“The book?”

“Oh – oh. Yes.” With a faint frown, she closed it and gave him her full attention. Her mismatched eyes were curious – but wary. Not unusual for her, he’d noticed. Though he had also just managed to sneak up on her.

“Did – you need something, Gale?”

“Well, all this travel and adventure has made it somewhat difficult to find my moment, but there’s something rather important I need to speak with you about – if you would be inclined to listen to me this fine evening.”

“Isn’t everything these days?” She gestured at the log she’d perched on, the faintest of half smiles breaking through her stoicism. “Have a seat. Unspool your woes. You won't be the first.”

He itched to ask more about the book. But that wasn’t what he was here for. “How shall I begin… ah! Yes! The beginning. You see, since you freed me from that stone I found myself trapped in I have seen you demonstrate remarkable guile and courage –”

Her smile dropped for some reason. And – was her gaze a little frosty all of the sudden? Did she not believe him?

“ – The way you diffused the tension between Aradin and Zevlor! How you convinced Kagha to release the girl. Or charged in to save that boy from those harpies. And you’ve demonstrated a fair amount of temperance as well – many a paladin would have run that fellow at the bottom of Jergal’s temple through, even though he’d shown no will to harm us! In short, I’ve grown to trust you, Odette.”

Silence. For several seconds that, by the third one, were starting to send prickles of unease down his spine. My but didn’t this woman have a stare on her that could freeze fire! The thing was, he couldn’t see what he’d done to invite it.

Though… perhaps it was just her face? It wasn’t the first time. She only really seemed to gentle around the very young, or very vulnerable. Perhaps it took conscious effort to do so.

“I see.” Another pause. “You’re being genuine, aren’t you?”

He balked. “Of course I am! I am many things, but I’ve never been accused of lying about my feelings towards others.”

That faint smile returned, and she let out a soft little laugh under her breath. She shook her head and ran a hand through her short raven curls with a sigh. “No, you wouldn’t would you? You have my apologies, Gale. I’m not particularly used to people being so complimentary.”

“With how often you save people?” He couldn’t help but ask.

“Gratitude and… flattery are different things, I think. Or… compliments, isn’t it? That’s what they are when they’re genuine…” This last bit was to herself.

He might have been offended if not for how clearly baffled she was. Personally, he didn’t know what to make of her reaction. It was… odd. And it made him wonder what she’d been doing before the Nautiloid captured them. What roads had their Paladin walked? And what Oath now kept her?

“Well, nevertheless,” he said, pushing forward. “The reason I make a point of saying this is that I’ve grown confident enough to tell you something I’ve yet to tell another living soul. Except for my cat.”

She turned to face him fully now. The only hint of emotion he could glean from her face was in the tilt of her head, and the slight furrow beginning to form between her brows. His heart leapt into his throat as the moment came to bear down on him. This was it. He may well find himself a wizard alone. And he was no Elminster – particularly not now, between the tadpole and the orb.

“You see I have this… condition. Very different from the parasite we share. And just as deadly.”

“Can it be cured?” she asked. Immediate, serious. She was sitting at attention and leaning in, examining him with fresh eyes and real, visible concern. He noted the moment she spotted the darkened veins around his eye, and began to follow them down to where they vanished under his shirt. Surely not the first time they’d been noticed. But the first they might hold her any significance.

The way she looked at him. Ready to leap to his aid. It made his throat feel a little tight. And brought to mind his befeathered and bewhiskered friend back in Waterdeep.

“No, it cannot be cured,” he said softly. Swallowing around a lump in his throat. He cleared it and sat up straighter himself. “And I can assure you I left no page unturned in reaching that conclusion.”

Odette seemed to draw back slightly as he said this, eyes shuttered. Something he couldn’t blame her for, given he’d all but told her his days were numbered. Woe betide them all should she learn of exactly how numbered all of their days might be, purely by virtue of his company.

Though that revelation… that one he’d keep close to the chest a while longer. If he were very lucky – lucky enough to survive the tadpole, and find his way back to his tower – she need never know the extent of the threat he posed.

“I can keep this condition under control, as indeed I've done for a significant amount of time! But that was under different circumstances altogether. Home, in Waterdeep.”

“Gale… stop blowing hot air and tell me what you need.” Her voice cracked on the last word, and her hands were fists in her trousers.

“What it comes down to is this,” he said, holding up a finger. He was patently unable to give up his habit of lecturing. Particularly with his nerves strung tight enough to snap and his heart a throbbing drum trying to choke him. He trusted her. He could only hope she proved worthy of it. He thought she would. Hoped.

“Every so often, I need to get my hands on a powerful magical item and absorb the Weave inside.”

There.

“...Are you telling me you’re addicted to magic?” Odette said. Her voice was flat, toneless. But her hands were no longer fists.

“What? No – no. It’s nothing like that. Magic isn’t some – some narcotic to me. It’s literally a lifesaver.”

She stared at him. “It’s not that I doubt you – only that I’ve seen what can happen to people addicted to drink when they go too long without it.” Her voice darkened. “What they can do to people. And how, ultimately, the lack of it can kill them.”

The unfortunate thing was, she had a point with that comparison. Even if it didn't apply here.

“Were it an addiction, it might provide some other benefit than keeping me alive,” he said. And realized a moment after doing so that technically, it did. In that it was also keeping everyone and everything else in his vicinity alive and intact. But – no. Not that. Not now. “It is more a salve for a burn, medicine for an infection – though it wont cure what ails me.”

A new tension in her shoulders drained away. “I see.”

“I would not burden anyone other than myself with this were the stakes not so high, and the means of obtaining such artifacts challenging for a humble wizard to face alone.” He leaned forward. Fear sawed at him now. He hadn’t expected her to agree outright of course – he still didn’t. But he had to absorb something, and soon. Elsewise all might well be lost, tadpole be damned. “It’s been a tenday at least since I last consumed an artifact – since before we were abducted. It’s only a matter of time before my craving returns.”

In truth, he could feel it already. An unpleasant tingling numbness deep in his chest. One that made his heart beat just slightly out of tune. That froze his lungs. It was only a bit of morning frost at the moment. But all too soon he would be reduced to gasping on his back, hands pressed to his chest as if that might hold the snarling demon within at bay.

“That is why I turn to you, I need you to help me find magic items to consume,” he said. Intense. Unable to help himself even though he’d planned the rational facade. His hand was pressed over his hammering heart, fingers clawed in his shirt. The memory of what was soon to come biting under his palm. “It is vital. Dare I say it, critical.”

There weren’t words to describe the danger. His panic at perhaps being rejected. He would turn to petty thievery if he must. Not for his own sake, but for the sake of every living being around them, should it come to that. He would need them, if only to clear enough ground so as to minimize the hells he would unleash in his death.

Odette was watching him with a new wariness. His intensity had perhaps been… a little much. But once he’d noticed that creeping hunger in his chest… the panic had taken root in his tongue. Though it might prove needful. And may well have served to illustrate his genuine need better than if he’d managed to remain collected.

“Where are we going to find these items?” she said.

That wasn’t a no.

“We’ve already done the finding – in fact you have one in your possession as we speak.” He gestured to where her greatsword lay. It glowed like a dying ember, even sheathed. “You know for yourself how hardwon such an item was and it will be no easier when even more are required to assuage my hunger.”

As he’d said before – he was no liar. He wouldn’t pretend this would be easy. The least of what he owed her was that honesty.

“There will be danger involved. Or great cost.”

Odette’s eyes had remained on her sword as he spoke. He’d heard the tale of how she’d gotten it. On the Nautiloid. From a devil. His understanding was that it had been a difficult battle, barely won and only undertaken out of sheer desperation with the temporary alliance of her illithid captors. Giving her allies the time they needed to reach the alien transponder that had ultimately dumped them all into this wilderness.

She let out a long sigh, and unsheathed the weapon. Flames danced up and down the blade, merrily viscous. Its sudden heat made the night air steam slightly around them. Very carefully, she offered him the hilt, and met his gaze.

“Take it."

Gale’s mouth didn’t quite fall open, but it was near thing. He stared at the sword instead.

And then his panic melted away like so much snow falling on a wildfire. He’d expected… well. He hadn’t known what to expect. But Odette disarming herself was not among them. He’d been right. As he typically was of course. Right to trust her. Right to tell her. Like his panic, his tension drained too. And all at once the symptoms of his hunger felt far less pressing.

For indeed, they were less pressing. It was the fear. There was still time. And to feed it too soon… it might upset the balance. Might increase its need to consume. He would have a hard enough time keeping up with it as things were. No need to tempt fate.

“I knew I could count on you!” he said. “And – and utterly pleased as I am by your enthusiasm, there is still time. I did not leave things quite until the last moment. I’m a good deal cleverer than that! Keep your weapon for now. Perhaps we shall find something less dear to be parted with. Faerun overflows with magically infused treasure after all!”

Odette considered him for a moment, but re-sheathed her sword.

Then, in a move that made his heartbeat stutter she set her hands on his shoulders and squeezed lightly.

“Thank you. For asking for help, Gale. I know… it’s not an easy thing.”

Her gaze was as true as her heart was. And he found himself wondering how he’d written her off, no matter how briefly. A wizard she was not. But perhaps she was something just as good. A truly, deeply, decent soul. No matter her viciousness in a fight.

“Nor your promise to sacrifice these items, Odette,” he said, his voice dropping with softness unfeigned. “I know what I am asking –”

“There’ll always be magic daggers and enchanted rings,” she said, cutting him off. “You’re the only Wizard of Waterdeep I know, though. Don’t…” she swallowed. He caught a glimpse of an old pain on her face. One that made those eyes – one brown and one purple – look so lightless he might have been frightened had the emotion not been so clearly one of hurt. Her grip tightened slightly on his shoulders and she wouldn’t meet his eyes. When she finished her thought, it was in a whisper soft voice. “Don’t kill yourself with your silence.

He lifted his hands to cover hers. “Believe me, I shan’t be quiet should my need arise.”

“Good.”

For a moment, they watched each other. And Gale couldn’t help but think of how long it had been since mortal hands – or the hands of anyone at all – had touched him. There had only been Tara. His heart beat stuttered as he looked at the planes of her face, illuminated by the firelight. It was a beautiful sight. He found himself wishing to stroke his thumb over the black flame tattooed on her forehead for some odd reason. Or better, to follow the curved pattern of dark flames along her jaw with his fingertips.

Odette was smiling back at him, and there was a softness there. But then she seemed to notice their closeness. She let go of him abruptly and pulled back. Put distance between them as she busied herself with setting aside her sword, with repacking the book.

He was all at once given the impression of many doors closing and locking one after another. By the time she turned back to look at him, her face was settled back into its normal vaguely intimidating neutrality.

“I should try to get some sleep,” she said. “And so should you. We need to find where those bloody goblins have holed up with the Druid. Interesting as that ruin turned out, our new friend is not the cure we’ve been looking for.”

“Indeed not,” he agreed, standing. He recognized a dismissal, no matter how kindly given. He made a dramatic gesture and half bowed. “Dear lady, may you sleep the sleep your kindness so richly deserves!”

She let out a surprised laugh, that mask breaking again. “And may you rest your eternally wagging tongue, dear wizard.”

A dig, but she said it with a fondness he found gratifying. He wasn’t unaware of his talkative nature, when he’d been given half the chance to chatter. Good that she seemed to like it.

“I shall do my very best to oblige.”

Gale returned to his tent with a lightness in his heart most unfamiliar, and a smile he would have been hard pressed to extinguish.

#gale #gale of waterdeep #gale dekarios #gale bg3 #gale/tav #named tav #tiefling tav #paladin tav #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #my writing #crossposted to AO3 #featuring vague story based justifications for taking the devil comanders sword #also remixed canon dialogue #i love this wizard disaster #also some of you know of odette #yes i made her a tiefling even though the screenshots are half-elf #i wanted to used different face options without modding

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guiltreservoir · 5 months

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as long as there is an ocean ✧ read on ao3

the abyssal plains of tommy's subconscious are littered with the carcasses of his father's favorite adages.

no matter how valiant his attempts have been to pry them free — and despite the meticulous, delicate nature of his methods — it seems that many of the sea-skeletons have been left sitting beyond salvation, now inextricable from waterlogged sediment. they're too far-sunk to extract safely; if lucky enough not to crumple like a sheet of discarded tissue paper on the journey down, he'd explode his lungs to red mist on the way back up to the surface. it's almost easier if he imagines them this way, as broken fragments of corpses too fragile to exhume:

the fleshy tissue of a half-eaten squid — actions speak louder than words. the crushed shell of an unfortunate lobster — beggars can't be choosers. the rotting remains of a clever eel — boys who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. the ribcage and spine of a starved shark — do as i say, not as i do.

one saying in particular has been mummifying for longer than the others, a giant humpback frozen in a state of watery decay, embalmed in the sandy gunk of his darkest trenches — keep your shoulders straight and your head on straighter. oft punctuated with a caustic, kid.

it's pretty ironic, considering the fact that tommy kinard has nary a straight bone in his body. maybe that's why the line burrowed itself so thoroughly into the deepest, slimiest crooks of the substrate of his mind, slow-growing algae coating the slippery crevices of his hippocampus to rankle him perpetually. tommy hasn't spoken directly with his old man in years; these days he couldn't if he wanted to, or at least not without a ouija board and an uncharacteristic flair for masochism, neither of which he cares to equip himself with.

nevertheless, the phantom whale fall of his father's most-reliable phrase continues to nourish the last hungry, lonely fish left scouring the ocean floor of tommy's mind. nearly every move he makes is centered around practicality, every decision sewn together by threads of vigilance and observation.

with nearly four decades of practice and application under his belt, he's gotten good at keeping his shoulders straight, and gay as he may be, he thinks his head's on just fine, although such would be a contradictory and controversial statement upon the ears of one thomas kinard, senior. thankfully he'll never have to hear it.

tommy can live with his own amendment to the man's words because tommy knows himself and therefore knows the truth. his posture is excellent and he's a considerably level-headed guy. he can't be straight; he doesn't want to be. what he can be is pragmatic. he can be logical, he can be useful, he can be rational. he can be quite capable and, as it turns out, even likable. he can be funny, and charming, and vulnerable with the right people. he can be queer, he can be gay, he can be loved, he can love. he can become without becoming unmoored.

for thirty-some good years, tommy kinard does a bang-up job at keeps his shoulders straight and his head on just fine. he's pushing forty when he meets evan buckley and eddie diaz.

───────────────

evan buckley and eddie diaz exist as a singular entity within the confines of tommy's skull. two sides of the same coin, grumbles the detached jaw of an imaginary anglerfish.

it takes some effort to extract one from the other, but tommy finds ways. over mutual interests in muay thai, basketball, and helicopters, he and eddie become fast friends. over mutual interests in each other's inquisitive minds, curious hands, and wanting mouths, he and evan become even faster lovers.

he makes out with one of them, roughhouses with the other; it all feels the same, gets identical synapses firing. he knocks eddie to the mat, steals spit-flecked exhales off of the inches of air near his wild-grinning lips and brings them home for buck to drink down, licking them into his ravenous mouth, delivering him secrets to unwittingly swallow. he smelts himself down to the base and seeps in between them, liquid copper in the nickel sandwich of their clad coin.

it isn't until tommy's got both of them sprawled out on his couch one night, months into his increasingly complex relationships with each of them, that he truly starts to grasp how evan and eddie might exist as a singular entity outside of his skull, too.

top gun's ending credits march, sans serif ants, to the glowing edge of tommy's television screen. fuzzy, synthetic white-blue haze pours into the room and across the skin of buck and eddie's limbs and faces in a manner that makes tommy think of marble hewn painstakingly into handsome statue, of rock tumbled smooth by a patient, perpetual stream, ever-flowing towards the sea.

tommy thinks, i could be a sculptor. i could be a river.

copper in the nickel.

the two men are draped across his sectional like lions in the sun, impenitent and unabashed in the way they take up space, in the way they take up each other. buck's legs are long, stretched out along multiple cushions, his head heavy on tommy's lap. eddie, on the opposite end of the couch from tommy, started out the evening upright, but the drone of the movie — combined with tommy's easy laughter and the literal and figurative warmth pouring off of buck — had helped to coax a more relaxed posture out of him. now he slouches deep into the pillows, legs spread wide to knock up against buck's bare feet where his sweatshorts ride up his quads. tommy almost expects the point of contact between the pair of them to spark, start a blaze that would surely incinerate the three of them in spite of their résumés.

his heart's been a tinderbox for long enough that he can usually recognize flint even when it's disguised as water; the thirst that parches him convinces him it's worth attempting a sip without regard of probable risk.

he lets out a long exhale and drops a hand to card through evan's hair, half-listens to eddie babble on about how the shots of the F14 fighter jets are still so cool all these years later. he's beaming like a kid the whole time, sunshine-ray of a smile gleaming straight at buck.

tommy watches as buck can't help but smile right back, and god, if the energy radiating off of them could be harnessed for physical usage, tommy would never have a utility bill again in his life. he watches, enraptured, as buck flexes and curls his toes against the soft dark hairs of eddie's thigh, pressing dents into his skin. watches as eddie presses back.

eddie falters in his warplane musings when buck's foot skids over and catches in the edge of his shorts.

buck says, "sorry," not convincingly.

eddie clears his throat and drags his gaze from the arch of buck's foot resting against his leg up buck's calf, to his knee, to where the exposed pale of his thigh disappears behind them hem of his shorts. he takes his time wandering up the rest of buck's body, lingering especially at the relaxed curve of his dick under loose cotton fabric, the relaxed curve of his gently parted lips. finally he meets buck's answering stare and blinks, languid, like he's searing something into his memory, buck-shaped sunspots in his retinas. he says, "no big deal," not convincingly.

before tommy's eyes, water transmutes into flint and back into water and over again, metamorphosing in a churning lazy whirl. it dizzies him, blurring his vision until there is no difference between the two; there's just a murky charcoal pool, molten obsidian shimmering like glass, rippling like the surface of an ocean less haunted than the one sloshing in his cerebrum.

an ocean glinting with the reflection of two incandescent stars careening towards each other at a devastating rate, a spectacle to behold.

relaxing his shoulders, tommy orders them to, "kiss," more certain than ever. when they hesitate, he adds, "each other," bracing himself for the likelihood of a stellar collision.

when eddie clambers on top of buck and leans down to crush their lips together, pushing his head down against tommy's thighs, pushing tommy out of his own, it feels more like the calm soar and twinkling glitter of a shooting star against the navy velvet sky, the soft crash of a wave against the edge of a silky coast.

there's no threat of unkind flame, no exploding celestial dust.

it feels like water.

tommy kneels at the sacred place where the luminous sea laps at the heavenly shoreline and drinks, and drinks, and drinks.

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drinks become shots become wandering hands in the generous backseat of a stranger's car, an obvious cocktail to use as a scapegoat for the hammering beneath tommy's breastbone. the depths of his mind bubble up with, trust your gut, not your heart.

he has mixed feelings about that one, but at present he's not sure he can trust any singular part of his corporeal form, so at least it half-applies.

hearts and guts aside, tommy is starkly aware that things between buck and eddie may be escalating a bit beyond his feasible reach. he'd come into the evening equipped with the knowledge that he's successfully constructed his own internal witch's cottage of cake shingles and sugared windowpanes in this questionable "date" night between the three of them, however mutually agreed upon the night may be. he's self-aware enough to understand that he's destined to walk himself straight back into it, naïve as hansel and gretel without the excuse of not knowing better.

he just hadn't realized how famished he's become, and how tempting his own makings would look.

with buck seated comfortably between himself and eddie, tommy has no real access to eddie outside of the smush of knuckles-on-upper-arm from the hand he's got slung around buck's shoulder. as per usual the concept of space does not seem to exist between the other men, and tommy's fingertips get wedged so tightly between their limbs that it feels like with just a little more effort, maybe they could do some damage. the sick, private, bourbon-drenched gutters of his mind surmise that maybe he'd let them.

he watches as they exchange a heated look and a hotter liplock, uncertain as to whether he'll ever get used to witnessing them like this. in the weeks following the fated night of their little home movie screening, tommy's been lucky enough to encourage and initiate several more exchanges of both kisses and conversation among the three of them.

"i... still want to be with you," evan had mumbled against his chest, as they laid in bed together the morning after their tag-team makeouts with eddie to the soundtrack of top gun's menu screen music on a muffled loop.

"i had hoped," was tommy's response. after a beat, "and eddie?"

buck had peered up at tommy, eyes so earnest and open and stupidly fucking blue. "yeah, yes, eddie," he'd said, almost apologetic. "i— i do want to be with eddie," like he had to.

"i know," tommy had told him, the organs in his abdomen heaving tumultuously. "it's okay, evan," he'd said, his heart a hummingbird fluttering frantic. like the idea wasn't sending his ribcage collapsing in on itself, he'd even managed, "i can leave whenever you're ready for me to go." he'd assumed all along that he was on borrowed time; couldn't be a beggar and a chooser.

buck, with love bursting forth from every single inch of his being, with more than enough to go around, had admitted to wanting tommy to stay, if tommy would be okay with it. he pitched the idea that they could talk to eddie, try this together, give it an honest shot.

tommy had flashed back to a childhood history lesson on the u.s. mint where he learned that certain coins aren't made in layers, but instead by melting all of the metals together to become a solitary slab. his copper edges fuse further into mirroring ponds of nickel.

three sides of the same coin, he'd thought to himself. imagine that.

"god, eddie," buck rasps now, voice low, clandestine enough to stay in the backseat. "want you so fuckin' bad."

eddie's answering, "jesus, buck, i— want you, too," honest and shameless, snaps tommy fully back into the present moment in perfect timing.

their rideshare driver whips into the driveway of tommy's house, personified stress wearing a thin windbreaker of customer service as he vocally ushers them out of the car — ahem, looks like we're here, have a pleasant rest of your evening, goodbye. as eddie and buck tumble out of the passenger's side rear door in a picture of resolute gracelessness, tommy, clutching stubbornly onto an ounce of awareness, pauses to give a rearview-mirror nod of thanks to the weary-eyed dude white-knuckling the steering wheel. he promises a significant gratuity for bearing with their shenanigans and lets himself out on the driver's side of the car.

while he steadies himself on his feet, gravel crackles under the wheels of the gratefully retreating sedan, headlight beams fading to shadow. tommy observes the silhouette of the inelegant, eight-limbed, two-headed harbinger-creature making its way to his home's front entrance in a clumsy tangle and waits for his innards to spike with fear, with reluctance. he meanders up the drive and overturns every stone lining the path to his warranted doom, expecting to find the tattered shreds of his decomposing clarity, or maybe a colony of vicious fire ants. all he finds is fertile, loamy earth, rife with potential.

he stumbles up his porch stairs and unlocks the door when he gets there, opening it for the lot of them to fall through together.

───────────────

together on tommy's mattress, buck and eddie writhe and moan and curse. they haven't been able to break apart since toppling out of the backseat. they kiss like it's the very thing keeping them alive.

from where he's snuggled up to buck's back, tommy's got a front row seat for the premiere screening of his most-likely demise. he can see the saliva bubblling on the edges of eddie's tongue as he smears it from buck's throat all the way to the cap of his shoulder, a glistening snail trail scattered through with blooming bruises he'd sucked into buck's skin minutes before. he can hear every wet catch of buck's breath in his throat, every soft grunt eddie lets out into against it, every exhale shared between them.

tommy's head spins, so god damn far from being on straight. he feels like a balloon released into the wind, miles above the cold and familiar waters of his deep-ocean, stranded somewhere in the high desert of his psyche. loose dry earth kicks up in a vortex around him, carried by the tempest of his culminating untended emotions. when the dust cloud settles enough for him to think, he recalls the term raison d'être.

it's french, that's why it sounds fancy, is what his father had said to teenage tommy, long before he'd cared to even attempt a grasp on the concept. he'd been moody, hormonal, and wildly, spitefully uninterested in all of the things the man he shared a name with held so dear. rolled his eyes at the gruff, translates to 'reason for being.'

"buck, buck, c'mon," is what eddie says as he scrabbles for a good grip on buck's shirt, taking fistfuls of fabric and wrenching it over buck's head in a frenzy. says, "come here," like buck isn't already melded into him, bare torsos flush, thighs slotted close. says, "come here," again, and it registers that eddie is calling for tommy, too.

tommy eyes snap onto eddie's across the naked curve of buck's shoulder to find them scalding. "fuck," he breathes out, "okay," like it's permission enough for all of them.

for now, it will suffice.

the skin stretched over buck's bulky trap muscle is tacky with eddie's spit when tommy sets his mouth against it, bursting salty-bitter on his tastebuds. buck whimpers into eddie's mouth and grinds his ass back against tommy's crotch; eddie's hips follow after them in a sinuous roll. into the blushing hollow of his ear tommy asks buck if he'd like to feel eddie inside of him, makes sure it's just loud enough for eddie to hear, too. he feels eddie's ankle hook around his own, overlapped with buck's.

"please, yes," urges buck, fervent and wanton, lust and liquor fraying the last threads of his hesitancy. "i've been wanting that."

"you have?" eddie asks, as tommy says, "he has."

"god." context aside, eddie's tone is reverent. he says it again, as though the word is synonymous with buck's name. then, like it's still a secret to himself, admits, "i've been wanting you, too."

buck groans and shifts, or maybe it's eddie — as tommy's faculties render off in the burn of both the top-shelf whiskey in his bloodstream and buck and eddie's immediate intimacy, it becomes progressively more challenging for him to distinguish the fine details. it all feels the same, gets identical synapses firing.

he tracks eddie's movements as he smooths a hand down buck's side, sure and attentive, as natural as breathing. when he keeps moving south to bump his fingertips up against the waistband of buck's jeans and the boxers beneath, buck's breath hitches, hips jerking. tommy tilts against them in pursuit.

eddie asks, "can i?" and it's double the approval he's seeking.

"yeah, eddie, please," buck begs again while tommy nods, delirious with overwhelm.

in an uncoordinated jumble, eddie gets buck flat on his back and makes himself a home between his open-lolling legs. right away his palms return to the broad planes of buck's chest, the curves of his strong stomach, the slight slants of his hips. he makes constellations out of kisses on buck's collarbone, his nipples, in the divot of his sternum.

it looks as close to worship as anything tommy's seen.

tommy wonders if it's worth telling eddie how he'd taken his time working evan open that morning, fucking him deep and thorough so he'd be easier for eddie to push inside of now. if it's worth telling eddie how he'd come, sudden and hard and so fucking good, from thinking about buck taking him so readily.

when eddie's devout, trembling fingers struggle to unclasp the button of buck's jeans, tommy decides to backburner the dirty talk. instead, he rests a hand on top of eddie's, gentle yet authoritative, and says, "let me help."

buck's hips lift for tommy's hands without second thought, making it simple to shuck the pants off of him as eddie shimmies out of his own. before he can even process the sight of evan buckley and eddie diaz naked, together, on his own mattress, tommy's met with twinning expectant gazes and understands that he's meant to strip, too.

"i—" thought i would stay on the sidelines, he tries to say. but as seconds pass under the scrutiny of the other men, the reluctance dies in his larynx, and he jostles around a bit until the denim of his pants is bunched down low enough to free his dick.

he's too preoccupied by the fact that he's got both objects of his affection directly in front of him, touching and loving on each other and spilling all of it onto him, to truly comprehend the magnitude of the moment. his head is so far into the atmosphere that he almost misses eddie say, "tell me what to do, tommy."

re-tethered to the earth by the string of eddie's voice, tommy doesn't miss buck's impatient, "aw, c'mon, eddie, just get in me." his desperate, "need you," is clear as day, clear as his afternoon sky irises, brighter against the rosy blush ruddying his cheekbones. he's always so damn pretty when he pleads.

tommy glimpses down at buck's dick, finds it stiff and pink and already leaking a mess onto his belly; he flicks across to the heft of eddie's where it rests heavy in the lax grip of his own hand. it's a beautiful cock, flushed dark and filled out, not quite as thick as tommy's but a nice, proportionate size. tommy knows buck will unfurl for him at once, a blossom to the morning sun.

meeting the bonfire of eddie's anticipative stare, tommy decides to say, "it won't take much, i got him ready for you this morning. right, baby?"

if buck could nod any more vigorously, he might snap his vertebrae. he adjusts the angle of his hips a little to make more of his ass visible, scoots onto a pillow so that he can prop himself up enough to get a better hold on eddie's waist.

"jeeesus," drawls eddie — a rare slip of his honeyed-rye texas lilt — and then, like he can't help it, "christ." his eyes rake down buck's body, idling on his twitching dick before trailing further, like he'll be able to find evidence: tommy was here.

that makes tommy smirk. he wishes he could keep his instructions ambiguous, left up for eddie's interpretation, something like he can handle whatever you're willing to give him. instead, mindful of the fact that this is largely uncharted territory for eddie, he suggests, "start with your fingers, you won't hurt him."

tommy's trusty bottle of nightstand lube is within convenient reach, making it no trouble to squeeze and slather some across eddie's fingers with a lewd jerk. a bit of extra coats the side of tommy's hand and he uses it to rub along the cleft of buck's ass, prompting a shiver out of him.

"there you go," tommy rumbles, "nice and wet."

the synchronous broken moan that the two let out when eddie finally finds the courage to nudge his fingers into buck is one that will most likely play like a broken-record loop within the walls of tommy's skull forever from this moment forward, for better or for worse.

buck promises, "i can take more," with the bleeding edge of a prayer still present in his tone. "i want more, want you, eddie, come on. it's alright, you can fuck me, you're not gonna break me."

eddie asks, "are you sure?" dually directed.

"never been more sure," buck affirms, as tommy says, "trust him, he knows his own limits," all the while knowing he can't make the same claim about himself.

regardless, he casts himself into the riptide, plummets into the undertow and captures buck's lips in a greedy kiss. he licks behind buck's teeth and drinks up his whines as eddie rides his dick along the slick valley of buck's asscheeks. before he even pushes inside, buck's making these fucking tiny wounded noises that make tommy's heart swell and cock throb.

when eddie lines up and sinks, at last, into the place inside of buck that tommy has come to learn and know and adore, buck breaks away from tommy's kiss with something close to a genuine sob. one of his hands finds one of tommy's, the other still firm on eddie's waist, keeping both of them close. he's got a leg hitched up over one of eddie's hips for better leverage, and his toes curl when eddie starts to move, shallow and slow.

eddie's name has never sounded better to tommy's ears than it does falling out of buck's lips now.

"buck." eddie's tone is reverent. he says it again, as though buck's name is synonymous with god, the two a singular entity within the confines of his skull.

tommy nearly has to look away from them, they blaze so brightly. evan buckley and eddie diaz, starfire contained in terrestrial form, crashing and combining and dazzlingly white-hot.

───────────────

white-hot aftershocks zap through tommy's nervous system as he sits at the edge of the mattress, back turned to the two other men. his fingers are gooey with spatters of buck's come mixed with his own, his softening dick sensitive and sticky as his entire body pulses from the dopamine spike of his orgasm. being a spectator to eddie and buck's otherworldly connection — and a helping hand in their ridiculously hot, intimate sex — has him feeling triply unmoored.

he's supposed to be getting them something hydrating to drink; he'd been the one to offer after eventually peeling himself free from the gordian knot of their bodies. evan always gets thirsty after, in particular when he gets a little teary from the pleasure overload, so tommy figures he could use a glass of cold water. they all could.

he tries to will his legs to stand; he finds his knees locked. impulse turns him inward and sweeps him cliffside on the tallest peak of his high desert mountain range. there, he can stand with his shoulders in repose and head in the clouds, squinting far into the distance where he can decipher the unmistakable expanse of an ocean that glints with the reflection of two incandescent stars careening towards each other at a devastating rate. a ghostly whale breaches the surface for a flash, a mere speck on the horizon from here, vanished before its presence totally registers.

his heavy eyelids flutter shut and he mulls, achingly, over the term raison d'être.

he can hear buck and eddie behind him exchanging lazy, smacking kisses and sweet murmured praises.

"you made that so good for me, thank you."

"mm, you were pretty fuckin' good yourself. now come kiss me some more."

the sounds and sentiments soak into tommy's soul like they're meant for him. his lips tingle as though the press of another mouth is against them; his ears warm as eddie waxes on about how fucking glorious that all felt. his heart swoops at evan's quiet, bashful laugh.

upon opening his eyes the fog in his line of sight clears, and even through a blur of unwanted tears he can clearly recognize that he is no longer in the desert but in the sacred place where the luminous sea laps at the heavenly shoreline. the call of the waves isn't far off at all — the surf is actually rippling at his toes, splashing at his knees and calves. he's been here since the night that eddie diaz kissed evan buckley in his lap, feet sunken into silt, warm tides rising and falling around him.

translates to 'reason for being.'

"come back to us, tommy," summons eddie, as evan's hands reach out and welcome him back down to their mess of rumpled sheets and sweaty limbs.

tommy thinks, i could be a river, and lets himself melt into the embrace of their current, stream into ocean, copper into nickel.

#bucktommy #buddie #bummie #this is so fucking extra. lmao #i was in my emo poetry feelings while writing okay #healing something in my teenage soul #i don't actually imagine them being quite *this* dramatic and complicated in actuality but god. is it a joy to write lmao #but i think it still has a happy(?) ending?? lmfao #idk. i just love writing messy + melodramatic + emotionally claustrophobic things #threw a whole kitchen sink of comparisons at the walls of this one and for better or worse many of them stuck ¯\_(ツ)_/¯#also this does feature some of my more unkind headcanons about tommy's father and related issues lmao #the gc is the originator/authority of the fact that our beloved tommy is not the first in a line of tommy kinards #and i personally believe that tommy had/has a contentious and complicated relationship with his family - namely his dad #and that he may or may not have a relationship with him at all anymore (obviously not in this fic because i decided to be over-the-top af)#but yeah #anyway #mine #oh and just a heads up - ao3 has proper capitalization and tags

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