deercountry | Birthday Party

Birthday Party

Who: Paul Atreides and all his CR
What: Throwing everyone’s favorite Duke a surprise birthday party
When: Forwarded dated to April 1st
Where: Bone House in Gaze

Content Warnings: Drinking, underage drinking, drugs (both fictional and not), drawings of space worms, skeletons, will add further warnings if necessary

When you arrive at the house in Gaze, (affectionately known as Bone House), a skeleton will open the door and offer to take your coat if you have one. No need to take your shoes off or anything!

The large house has been decorated with black streamers and confetti. In the entryway and hung on the railing to the second floor that overlooks the entrance to the great room are large banners that say “HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAUL” (though one looks like it used to say “Jaune” but was just painted over? Whatever).

In the Living Room, there is a large board and various colored markers for people to write messages to the birthday boy. There is also a table full of bottled water and various couches, chairs, and beanbags to collapse into if the party gets to be too much and one needs a quiet place to rest or a place to chill if you’ve imbibed too much… well, whatever you had.

It is also where all the food and drinks are.

There’s an extremely large charcuterie board with the usual meats, cheeses, and olives as well as an extremely eccentric collection of snacks ranging from individual sized Cheez-it bags, to humungous bags of Doritos and salty chips, as well as nearly every kind of Oreo one can imagine.

There are also various cakes, all angel food. Some are misshapen, some have an attempt at being frosted with whipped cream and fruit, one even says “Happy Birthday Ka-” before that was hastily covered with a bunch of strawberries jammed really close together.

At the island, a skeleton is playing bartender. Surprisingly, it can seem to take and understand individual orders, but there’s always a constant flow of tequila shots being made and sent out to the great hall to be served by another skeleton.

And, no, of course it’s not going to check your age to see if you’re legal. It’s a skeleton. Why would it care?

The Great Hall is the center of activity and where everyone is encouraged to mingle and have fun. There is a skeleton on the grand piano in the corner gleefully playing piano covers of the hits from the Shrek Soundtrack with the occasional cover of “DaRude’s Sandstorm” when it has another one to help out.

In another corner, on huge piece of paper that spans nearly 6ft wide and 8ft tall is drawing of an Arrakis sandworm and it’s giant maw. The game is Pin the Tooth on the Sandworm and it’s… very easy… because the worm maw is most of the board. Even if the skeleton spins you as you’re blindfolded, it’s pretty hard to lose. If you manage to do it, which is likely, the skeleton running the game will award you a tequila shot! If you lose, the skeletons will award you a tequila shot (but it’s rail).

(It’s a drinking game, isn’t the point to drink?)

There’s also a table that has many candelabras on it, numbering up to seventeen. They’re still lit and burning even though there is a sign that says “make a wish!” even though it almost looks like a shrine for the dead.

…It’s maybe clear that the concept of “birthday candles” was greatly misunderstood.

There is also a skeleton dealing out small doses of “Spice”, a psychoactive drug straight outta the Duneverse. However, you must check in with this Skeleton to get a dose. There will be no “permanently melting your brain with ancestral memories” at this party!

Teacher’s/God’s/Jod’s/The Emperor Undying’s study, adjacent to the main hall, is closed and locked. Though, the lock is fairly easy to break if someone really wanted to get in. There’s not even skeletons guarding.

That said, many things are warded with eerie runes of blood and bone.

So, fuck around and find out.

The upstairs is generally off limits. Party goers can climb up the stairs, and it’s encouraged if they want to look over the Great Room from above, but all of the bedrooms are carefully guarded by more skeletons who will SCREAM VERY LOUDLY if you try to enter and will become hostile if done by force.

Of course, this won’t happen if you are with someone who lives in the house.

Enjoy the party! Mingle away!

((ooc: if you have any questions or anything, please hit me up at

worldtype)) or via PM.))

Birthday Board | At the Party | The Morning After | IC Party Games | Spice Dealer

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Paul wakes up knowing, beyond all doubt, that something awful happened over night. The details aren't clear (in and of itself alarming), but the evidence of his external and internal senses are excruciatingly so even before he opens his eyes.

His mouth tastes horrible. He's dehydrated and riddled with the byproducts of liver processes that have gone awry, his blood a gummy, imbalanced mess in his body. Some thin metal mesh is pressed against the bare skin of his back where his shirt has ridden up, and on the other side of him -

On the other side of him are two bodies. The one whose chest Paul's head has fallen on is firmly muscled, with a heartbeat strong enough to worsen the throbbing in Paul's head. The other one, the one whose sternum Paul's outstretched hand presses against, is slim, bony, and pulseless.

In the first blurry moments of waking up, peeling one eye open while the other stays crusted shut, Paul forgets that Kaworu doesn't normally have a heartbeat. He lifts his head and digs his fingers against the thin lattice of sensitive nerves over bone, which will make for a rather rude awakening as soon as the sensation cuts through the fog of sleep.

The petite, pulseless body on the other hand, is dead asleep. Not contentedly, but purposefully, as though he unconsciously knows that the sooner he wakes up, the worse he will feel. Therefore, sleeping as long as possible is the goal. More so than usual.

So when there’s a furious press on his wrist, he kicks out at the offender. He has a head full of nice memories and a body that’s completely destroyed. Do NOT do this to him.

Kaworu is alive enough to lash out, which is a good sign. His bony foot is as sharp as ever, and thankfully (where are all their limbs, anyway?) accurate, connecting just under Paul's knee.

"Kaworu," he hisses, and regrets it immediately, "You'll wake up-" a brief upward glance "-Midoriya-kun."

Then, because concern throbs worse than the tender spot on his leg, or the mass of tender spots that have replaced his head: "Are you all right?"

“No.”

Kaworu tries to curl up and bury his face in both the pillow and whatever part of Paul he can get to. His body feels miserable and heavy, like his limbs are weighted and his brain can barely connect them so they’re useless and floppy. So he feels terrible. He feels like he could start spewing sea water everywhere again, except it would be pure tequila.

He can’t even think about Midoriya.

“I think I’m dying.”

Paul pushes up onto his elbow, swallowing thickly around the residue that's colonized his mouth as he reaches over Midoriya to brush at Kaworu's tangled, sweat-tacked hair.

"You aren't going to die," Paul assures him, not remotely convincingly, "We'll get you a new heart. Teacher will gr-"

That's one of the least sensible things he's ever said aloud, and he vaguely and grimly remembers calling the taste of human skin 'leathery'. Paul frowns, twisting his head to wipe a stray trace of dampness from the corner of his mouth.

"Do you remember what happened?"

Even in his miserable state, there's something nice about the touch to his pulsing, aching forehead and he leans into Paul's hand, cat-like as ever. The touch is soothing.

Wait his... heart? Slowly, he reaches down to feel his chest. Nope. S^2 engine is still chugging along. He squints at Paul for a second before realizing that makes his head hurt worse. A heavy sigh.

"We did shots, danced, played games, did Spice, then sat on the couch. I think there was more but I don't remember."

Kaworu's bleary list lines up with what Paul recalls of the night, each word touching off mnemonic cues that at first reassure him. Alcohol, sugar, dehydration, and lack of sleep explain most of how he feels, including the hovering anxiety. He'd been so sure he'd been handling himself better than that.

He'd felt sure he'd been handling himself well at all, but the soft hair tickling his fingers evokes the feeling of the nape of Kaworu's neck under his hand, and - he's not sure, a clutching worry that he has to remind himself is at least partially depleted neurotransmitters.

"We...came up here?" He squirms in the bed, which is at least large enough for all three of them, and whatever lumpen objects they apparently dragged in to line their nest like Iskierka. "I should have had you drink more water. I'm sorry."

He strokes the fringe of Kaworu's hair again, soothing and conciliatory.

"Or someone brought us up here. I don't remember."

Unlike Paul, Kaworu feels at ease. Nauseous, and like something is burrowing into his skull just above his eye, but at ease. The party happened. It was okay. It was better than okay, it was good and Paul is good. Idly, but not thoughtlessly, he reaches out and gently runs his fingers across Paul's cheek bone as if to confirm he's here. Everything is here and it's not a story he tells himself to pass the days as he stares at white walls and white ceilings.

"It's alright. I'm alright. Are you?"

Kaworu's fingers are welcomely cool as they skim over his face, dissolving anxiety as they glide. He turns his face into the touch and half-closes his eyes with a short, settling exhale.

"I'm all right," he says, his hand drifting down to let him slip his fingers into the anchoring bind of Kaworu's hair, just above his ear. "I feel terrible. There must have been something wrong with the tequila."

As for who brought them up here - Paul glanced at the sleeping form between them, thinking of how easily Midoriya had carried Paul on his back out of a collapsed basement, once.

"Should we wake him up?"

Midoriya is lying on his back in an unfamiliar place. He can tell by the missing ambient sounds of western Crenshaw and the scent of a room other than his own. For a fleeting moment, he wonders if he landed himself in the hospital again. His head feels thick, awful, and there's a weird taste in his mouth. He catches a snatch of a familiar voice. In its direction, his head is already turned slightly--some subconscious effort by Midoriya-of-last-night-and-this-morning to prevent gagging on anything, should his stomach rebel.

Should we wake him up?

He unsticks his eyelids just enough and has the briefest moment of alarm. The green-limned darkness, the forest, running--He's not Corrupted. That's not what his current affliction feels like. He's indoors. There are two people here. He identifies their pleasant familiarity to him before the people themselves.

It was Paul's voice, and--yes, Kaworu. They're very close, at ease. Everything is all right. They're very close--to him--They're all in a bed--

His eyes spring completely open. If Kaworu thought he was dying, Midoriya feels like his soul has left his body. "Guys, are you--are we--I mean, if we, it's fine if we--Are you OK?"

Midoriya's movements break Kaworu's concentration. It's not out of shame but simply distraction that causes him to drop his hand from Paul's face onto the bed. Then he moves it closer towards Midoriya, an affectionate but distinctly different sort of caress down the hero-in-training's face. He's here. He's alright. Well... he probably feels terrible just like Kaworu and Paul do, but that's something that can be dealt with.

"Izuku-kun... you promised you'd make me eggs. You should do that. If you're able."

Edited 2022-04-09 05:32 (UTC)

Midoriya's snapped wide eyes and the particular strained quality of his cut-off sentences (concern, not shame or disappointment, Paul notices) paint a vivid picture, and so Paul elects not to join Kaworu in petting Midoriya's paled face.

"We're fine," he says, letting his arm drape loosely over his chest instead, "And we didn't. You'd remember if we did."

Even gritty-eyed and somehow still groggy, Paul manages a slight affront in his tone. It's not entirely fair, memory rarely being a matter of what one wants to recall or not when untrained, but he feels miserable enough to be a little self-pitying.

Midoriya follows Kaworu's hand with his eyes, but he hasn't got the energy to muster a proper reaction. He shuts his eyes and opens them again, as if that will fix his throbbing head and desecrated inner ear. He picks through memories--drinking games, spice, getting the shower turned on him while he was asleep--in an achronological haze. The last thing Midoriya remembers is hanging out with them. They must have (drunkenly?) directed the skeletons to allow Midoriya in here. There may have been carrying involved. Midoriya's got the strength for it, Quirk or no Quirk.

"That's not how blackouts work, but thank you Paul-kun. I'd want--Anyway, I don't remember how I got here..."

He's not nice enough to Paul's pride to refrain from reminding his friends how the poison in their blood works. He knows the theory, if not--obviously--the practice. He lets out a small, relieved sigh. If he actually did stupid stuff--other than the other stupid stuff he does remember--like kiss his friends, he'd want to remember, if only to make sure they were fine.

"Water... We need water first..." His mouth has the consistency of glue. Where's that pitcher of water he had last night? He tries to shift, and the room lurches as he flattens on his back again. Feebly and with terrible aim, he grasps at their arms in solidarity. "Ughhh... Give me a minute..."

“Remember what?” Kaworu blinks like a little baby animal, making it seem impossible that he could be so deeply thirsty and yet so naive at the same time. An impossible contradiction but that’s somehow fitting for a creature that is both boy and angel.

He idly rubs his nose on Midoriya’s shoulder, trying to clear out an early morning itch and shifts his hand back to Paul’s cheek. An affectionate thumb strokes the skin a few times before dropping to his bony shoulder and tapping out a soft rhythm.

“You carried us, probably. I wish remembered.” It would have been very attractive to see Midoriya carry them both.” He doesn’t think he could walk now so definitely not last night.

“There’s water in the bathroom.”

As host, Paul should heave himself out of bed in pursuit of water to fulfill his guests' needs, but as survivor of both a poisoning attempt and Midoriya's cruel dismissal of his memorability (he's being fully petty now, not just slightly) Paul feels certain rules may not apply. It's not as though anyone else in this city seems to even understand what the law of hospitality means, if certain of his clarifying memories are to be trusted.

"I think the pitcher is on the floor," he offers, lying back down in the comfort of the bed under Kaworu's heavy-seeming hand. He can just see both of their faces if he lays his swollen head on the cushion of his own arm, so he does, smiling faintly but genuinely under half-lidded eyes. He resembles nothing so much as the indolent undead lizard lolling on the bedroom floor.

"Midoriya-kun wanted to know if we did anything in bed besides sleep," Paul informs Kaworu, helpfully, "Which I think is very thoughtful of him, like carrying us and making us eggs."

Unlike when he was spice-relaxed, Midoriya drops his eyes demurely under the assumption that he doesn't have permission to watch someone being tender so close at hand. Midoriya understands why Kaworu's knowledge is both comprehensive and horribly spotty: He's poorly socialized. Midoriya understands having a past like that on a personal level. Furthermore, Midoriya only trusts the education Kaworu received as far as he can throw it (Quirklessly). He finds himself, at times, clarifying for him, even at the expense of a slight rosy tinge of embarrassment, like he does now.

"It'd be a shame if I didn't remember my first kiss... Let me up if you want eggs."

Midoriya wriggles slowly, experimentally, off the bed. He's not as nimble as usual, try as he might not to disturb the other two. ("Sorry--sorry--") Certain allowances must be made when one's host doesn't feel well and doesn't know how to make omurice. (Whether or not Paul can even handle rice has also been hotly debated.) Midoriya has been volunteered to make eggs, which he was going to do anyway, and he's going to put these two lazy good-for-nothings on dish duty, which they were probably going to do anyway.

He finds a cup with the pitcher, fills it with water, downs it like a person stranded on hot desert sands, fills it again, and sets it and the pitcher on the nearest surface. He can feel, if not see, toxins leaving his skin. He desperately wants a shower, but--food first. He steps on a candy wrapper--

That's not a candy wrapper.

He resists the urge to leap into the air. He rises holding a (wrapped) condom in his hand. He looks at his friends, one with--again--a childhood lacking in certain life knowledge, the other from a different planet entirely. He dimly remembers something written on the Birthday Board about one of Paul's presents.

"Just checking... You two know how to use these, right?"

As Midoriya scoots out, Kaworu sleepily raises an arm for him to leave without trouble, then immediately rolls over into the warm spot on the bed that he left behind, curling closer to Paul. His back presses against the taller boy's chest as Kaworu's knees curl to his own, completely indulgent in a way that is almost a little annoying.

He feels horrible but that's a standard for how he's lived his life; it's just a different sort of horrible. So he doesn't let the pounding in his head stop him from watching Midoriya down the water like he's a dried up husk of a Pro Hero. Then he tilts his head, finally understanding what Midoriya means, only to tilt further when the other boy holds up a small object that... he has no idea what it is.

"No." Is honesty a ever a bad policy? Kaworu Nagisa doesn't think so. "If you want to have your first kiss, I could kiss you."

DO NOT. Unless you really want to. (He definitely threw up in a potted plant last night or something).

Ever observant, Midoriya can likely pick up from the easy, reflexive looping of Paul's arm over Kaworu's bundled, nestling self that this isn't a new configuration for them. Paul doesn't regret it, but he does think of it only after it's already done.

Then Midoriya calls attention to the bright plastic packet in his hand, Kaworu makes his offer, and it's all a little bit much for the condition he's in. Paul's already creased eyes narrow further, and he briefly releases Kaworu in reaching for his weapon.

"I know how to use your primitive Earthling protectives," he says, archly, and hurls a pillow at Midoriya with all the speed and accuracy he can muster. It's an excellent throw, under the circumstances.

He's not flustered by any of it. There's nothing about things like that which Paul doesn't understand the mechanics of, or sees anything to get worked up over about. He's simply insulted by the implication of his ignorance.

Blood rushes to his face as he looks completely away. He thinks Kaworu might have put that less baldly, for the sake of all their horribly throbbing heads and Midoriya's vivid imagination--all while he's holding a condom, in front of Paul, whose only objection is his knowledge being called into question. It's so much to unpack--not the condom part, not even its intended purpose, but the part that involves him, here, in this room. It's a little like being blindsided when the other two handed him their drawing, but fueled by the panic of what-does-he-say-now.

Salvation comes in the form of a pillow. He hears Paul move, and he sort of expects and accepts the whump on the back of his head.

"I was just checking! It's important!" he blusters over his shoulder without venom while a new wave of dizziness and ache riots over his skull. Unlike Paul, Midoriya doesn't think of the closeness of the two on the bed at all. Waking up to the face touching was enough. Really, the true shock is that Paul knows how to use a condom, and Kaworu doesn't. It underscores the general sense that no one in this room knows what they are doing.

If there's one thing Midnight-sensei (and the internet) taught him, it's that people can live their best lives in an extremely sex-positive way. Midoriya, at the moment, feels extremely unsexy. There's nothing sexy about feeling like a blob that got hit by a train. Midoriya makes the executive decision that this, all of this, is something for future Midoriya to think about--even if future Midoriya is just the more hydrated one cooking eggs.

"...Thank you for offering, Nagisa-kun, but my mouth tastes like something died in it. If you have a spare toothbrush, I will take that. I'm going to--I'm putting this here--" The condom goes next to the water jug. "I'm going to make breakfast, and I'm going to show you how to use this."

"Oh, there's one in the bathroom."

Kaworu doesn't really understand the priority of cleaning your teeth instead of getting your first kiss, but he supposes that is why Midoriya makes a good hero and is the one getting out of bed to cook them eggs. He has priorities and they are the correct ones.

Instead, he reaches over and grabs the little condom packet to examine it before flopping back down on the bed. It's not that he doesn't know what sex is or how it works but his education has largely been clinical and detached. Certainly, his creators never imagined he'd ever be in a situation where he needed to understand these things for his own benefit.

Tongue between his teeth, he examines the package. An earth protective? This tiny thing? He rips the package open to find something circular, thick at the edges and thin in the center, and a bit slimy. Weird. When the center domes outwards, he realizes the edges can be rolled down. So he unrolls and oh! Oh. He sees it now.

Then Midoriya's words echo in his very sore brain and he glances into the bathroom. "You were going to show me how to use this? That's very forward, Izuku-kun."

While Kaworu toys with the colourful packet, Paul takes advantage of his reach to secure the glass of water. He drains it twice in quick, determined succession, quelling the rebellion of his stomach by will alone. When done, he fills it again for Kaworu, then resettles into the soothing, supportive warmth of the bed.

Midoriya truly is a hero, so thoughtful towards their well-being and willing to pry himself upright to attend to their needs. It's a shame, Paul thinks, given what he's about to do. He really deserves better.

"Are you going to ask me to watch the demonstration as well?" He tucks his face into Kaworu's tangled hair, breathing deeply of reassuring salt breeze. "I apologize for my presumption. I'm sure we both have a lot to learn at your feet, Midoriya-sensei."

Edited 2022-04-15 03:40 (UTC)

On the way to the bathroom, he nudges the pillow on the floor towards Shinji-kun the lizard, who deserves it more than Paul, and who does not deserve to witness any of this.

Midoriya's life is already vastly improved with the application of fluoride and abrasion. Funny how the simplest things can make feeling like hell so much better. He's already thinking ahead to breakfast--He chokes on his toothbrush. Hurriedly spitting in the sink and blocking his gross toothpaste mouth from sight with a hand, he turns and sputters,

"On a banana! I was going to find a banana!"

Friendship ended with Kaworu and Paul. Toothbrush is his new friend now. Shinji-kun can come too.

Shinji-kun does deserve it more than Paul and to be free from this horrible conversation. Sadly, he does not have the wherewithal to do anything but simply sit there and experience.

At Midoriya's sputtering, Kaworu laughs, soft but clear like a ringing bell. And for a moment, he's overcome enough that he forgets that his head hurts or that he feels nauseous because he's just happy to be here in this place with two people he cares for very much. Then the moment passes and he's forced to clamp his mouth shut for a good thirty seconds before meekly reaching over to sip at the water.

"Well. You still could."

He reaches under his pillow and pulls out... another condom. Thanks Johnny the insecure condom fairy for providing.

The plethora of strainers and condoms (both of which Paul is gradually shifting aside for comfort's sake, as he discovers them) leaves Paul wondering what eventuality they were collectively anticipating when they went to bed. Surely, Sensei Lawrence didn't just fling a handful of luridly packaged contraceptives into the bed itself.

(Though when he thinks about it, that does sound...plausible. But the strainers?)

"You haven't even had your first kiss, and you want to get fruit involved in the proceedings? You know, there's no need to rush into things like that." Paul's voice emerges silkily from behind the protective barrier of Kaworu, whose relative innocence in this teasing hopefully renders him enough of an bystander to serve as an angelic shield from retaliation.

Under the swathe of blankets, meanwhile, Paul strokes lightly under Kaworu's sternum along a calming meridian line as the other boy sips at their communal water glass. He knows the tremors of Kaworu's nausea well, although in a wholly less celebratory context.

He concentrates on splashing cold water on his face. It's another simple thing that improves his physical wellbeing more than he thought it would. The other is Kaworu's joy. Catching sight of himself in the mirror, he attempts to calm his bedhead--fails--exits the bathroom, drawn by the abrupt stop of Kaworu's laughter.

Faint concern turns into a dubious look when Kaworu produces another stray condom. He now has to wonder if Johnny Lawrence planted the condoms like a scavenger hunt, or if they more innocently fell out of their package and were strewn around the room. Surely just hurling them into someone's bed is too irresponsible. He hopes Shinji-kun doesn't discover any of them.

He knows Paul's slyness. It's adjacent enough to be sultry, given the subject matter, but Midoriya's on guard now. Paul won't get him a second time if he can help it. (He still can't help another tinge on his freckles, but he refuses to avoid those green eyes with his own.) He has another thought, knowledge that must be imparted, now that he has a closer look at the slimy transparent wobbling thing in Kaworu's hand. He strides (gamely, he thinks) over and prods it.

"Maybe not a banana. This needs something huge, like an eggplant. Since you know so much, Paul-kun, I don't need to tell you this won't actually be useful, since Lawrence-sensei got the wrong size."

dude, where's your heart? | midoriya "deku" izuku | kaworu nagisa

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