Hannibal (or someone's) house, Saturday morning

[sharp_as_knives]

Tristan stirred and his subconscious registered a soft surface under him. He woke, his hand going to his knife, but there didn't seem to be any immediate danger. He was in a very soft...bed?

He frowned. It was warm, and soft, and there was firelight at his back, but where was he?

Comments

[furnaceface]

Wasn't the warm bed the important part? And maybe the guy Tristan was sharing it with, this morning. That particular guy was just beginning to stir, in fact, growing dimly aware that something about Hannibal was... off, this morning.

Hard to miss, even while asleep, when you were a telepath who was well-attuned to Hannibal by this point.

//Hnn... You alright, there?//

He wasn't awake enough yet to do the functional adult thing and just look. That involved admitting that it was morning and opening his eyes. Bah.

[sharp_as_knives]

What -? A memory he'd thought was a dream came back: a weekend spent in an odd place with a weird name. A rich house and a man with a voice in his head. Had it happened again?

Tristan turned, then jolted backward, scrambling from the bed - the bed was on fire!

[furnaceface]

Well, there was nothing quite like a sudden surge of shock coming from the man who was scrambling away from him to do the trick and wake Jono up the rest of the way. He sat bolt-upright, wide-eyed, trying to puzzle out what was--

//You're not Hannibal.//

Fantastic observation, Jonothon.

[sharp_as_knives]

Tristan cursed in Scythian, then, "Vos ardentes!"

Also a sterling observation.

He looked around to find...what? Water? A door? What was going on here?

[furnaceface]

Aah. The Latin. This guy. And here Jono was sitting in bed with his wrappings off, and maybe he could be forgiven for facepalming so early in the morning.

//Here, no, look... It's fine. I'm fine.//

Just... On fire. Jono heaved a mental sigh and reached for a shirt or something to hide the worst of the flames behind, at least for now.

[sharp_as_knives]

Fine? How was he alive? And...why was there no heat? It wasn't spreading... "Quid agatur?" Tristan had his knife out now, but he wasn't sure what he could do with it, really. Or at all.

[furnaceface]

Jono paused in his reach for a shirt, eyes coming to rest on that knife. He froze, eyes narrowing for a moment. And then he shook his head. No, it wasn't this man's fault he was here. And he had every reason to be terrified.

He held his hands up and backed away.

//Relax, mate. I've got no interest in hurting you or even fighting you. Didn't know I was going to wake to you here today, or I would've kept this,// he waved at his face, //under wraps.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Tristan didn't quite catch all that meaning, but the lack of aggression got through. And the lack of any sort of worry about the fire. He squinted against the light and repeated a bit more forcefully, "Quid agatur?"

[furnaceface]

Jono kept his hands up where Tristan could see them. Kept his tone cool, calm. Tried to keep his eyes off of that knife.

//Long story. You want to know about the fire first, or just how you got here?//

[sharp_as_knives]

"Est quod magiam potest?" Tristan shrugged. "Uter? Utrumque?"

[furnaceface]

Jono was quiet for a moment, picking out the meaning of those words and contemplating just how he would explain the rest.

//Magic might have had something to do with you being here now. But my face, but the fire, that isn't quite magic.// He shrugged awkwardly. //That part is just what I am.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Tristan squinted at him. "Dæmonium?" Was he some otherworldly creature? Tristan had never met one of those, although he'd been told they existed.

[furnaceface]

That... was an easy enough word to translate, even without resorting to his powers. And it was a fair enough assumption, wasn't it? Jono debated trying to explain what it meant to be a mutant to Tristan for, oh, all of three seconds, and then decided against it.

//Not... quite,// he ventured. //Human, mostly. Just... different. Not a demon or a monster or anything of the like, just...//

He faltered for a moment, trying to come up with the right word.

//... Cursed.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"Malum maledictionem." Tristan gave the flames (and Jono) a dubious look. "Non nocebit?"

[furnaceface]

//No pain,// Jono agreed, shrugging his shoulders. He... wasn't going to explain that that was mostly because there wasn't really much left there to feel the hurt. //This is old. Years and years like this. I'm not going to burn away.//

... Probably.

[sharp_as_knives]

Tristan shook his head. None of this made any sense, but then it hadn't the last time, either, from what he remembered.

Actually, he'd spent a lot of time trying to build a fire in order to cook, if he recalled. But all the things here had been strange.

He shrugged. "Tu coquis?"

[furnaceface]

Jono was going to need a moment to just be silently amused that every time Hannibal wasn't quite himself, the tables turned and it was Jonothon's job to feed him.

//I can. Probably not much that's quite like what you're familiar with, though.// A beat. //Hungry, are you?//

It was going to be a steak and eggs morning, he could tell.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hey, food was important!

Tristan shrugged. Food was food. How many sorts were there? You boiled the meat or you cooked it over fire. "Sic."

[furnaceface]

See? That's what Jonothon had once thought. And then he went and lost his ability to actually eat any of it. He shrugged as well, and then pulled himself out of bed, making a reach for, at the very least, a t-shirt to cover most of the flames with.

//Then I suppose it's time for breakfast,// he replied. //I need to head to the kitchen to feed the cats before they start knocking things over anyway.//

Because cats.

[sharp_as_knives]

...He fed the cats? Couldn't they hunt?

Tristan sheathed his knife and waited to follow him. "Tristan," he introduced himself with a gesture. Had he learned this man's name before?

[furnaceface]

Sure, the cats could try. But there were no mice in this house, and one cat, while he'd likely been an accomplished ratter in his heyday, was now old and deaf, and the other wasn't much larger than the mice, herself. It would probably end... poorly.

//Jonothon,// he replied, mimicking the gesture before heading for the bedroom door. //Jono, for short. Pleasure.//

They had made introductions, but that had been a while ago. They could probably both be forgiven for having slippery minds. This place was overwhelming at the best of times.

Mostly, Jono was just happy that the knife was being put away, now.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Jono," Tristan repeated, nodding. He followed Jono downstairs, gradually realising this was the same rich house he'd been in before. Or one similar enough as to make no difference. Strange place.

[furnaceface]

For what it was worth, the place was strange even to Jono, sometimes. He was used to living in high-end surroundings thanks to all of his time on assorted X-teams, but those had really only taken up a fraction of his life, and less than that once he started worrying about the overall tally of lifetimes crammed into his head.

He made his way into the kitchen, gesturing for Tristan to take a seat if he felt so inclined, and started poking through the fridge. At the sound of the fridge door opening, Joni made her way into the kitchen, giving a little mew as she did so. Because breakfast.

... She did need to take a moment to sniff at the new person's feet. Hello, new person!

[sharp_as_knives]

Ah. Not a cat, but a kitten. She probably still needed to learn hunting. Tristan leaned down to let her sniff his fingers, then rubbed her head. "You will grow into a fine hunter," he told her in Scythian. "Keep learning."

[furnaceface]

Jono glanced over his shoulder and gave a little corner-of-the-eyes smile at that. Already, Joni was deciding that this man was her best of friends.

Of course, that was basically Joni with anybody. She gave his fingers a sniff, and then purred and started winding back and forth under his hand, soliciting all the scratches she could get while Jono served out the meat that Hannibal kept aside for the cats.

He wasn't going to tell Tristan just how long she'd been a kitten for. He was going to just finish serving out the cat food, and then go poking around the fridge again for the meat that he knew was safe. And eggs. Eggs were definitely safe.