not_every_mage | Holiday Inn, Limbo City, Friday Evening

Holiday Inn, Limbo City, Friday Evening

Anders had booked and paid for the room, ignoring the clerk's dirty look at the blood and muck on their clothes. They wouldn't be the only people caught in the day's devastation looking for someplace to sleep tonight

He'd silently followed Dante through the hotel halls to their room, and placed a quick order for pizza before he took off his boots and crashed out on the bed. The thousand bruises and scrapes of the battle stung his skin.

He should shower. He didn't want to move.

He turned to Dante, still registering faint surprise at the newly white hair. (He supposed they were lucky if that was the worst permanent change Dante saw.) Words failed him when it came to addressing the true horror of the day, but he should at least say something

"They said the pizza should be here in about half an hour," he said. "I'm actually impressed it's not longer, considering."

[OOC: For one, NFB.]

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"Hey, cool," Dante said. "'m not getting dumped over my hair today."

He ran his fingers up through Anders' hair again. "And you're stuck with me for a while."

"Looks like it," Anders agreed, tracing a thumb over Dante's mouth. "I'm selfish enough to think that almost makes everything that happened to the city today worth it."

He knew that wasn't quite right, morally speaking. One life against half a city destroyed? It shouldn't have felt as balanced as it did to him.

He decided not to question his feelings too much. Not right then.

Dante let out a quiet breath. "It wouldn't have been worth it if it was just for me," he said.

"My mind knows that," Anders nodded. "My heart's the one that's just happy to have you, and doesn't understand the cost."

He said this cautiously, as if worried how Dante would judge him. He was feeling it out for himself.

"Huh," Dante said, sinking back onto his back to think about that. Not in a judgy way, just... thinking about that for a second.

He finally shifted, looking up at Anders. "So... how are you feeling, anyway?"

Anders frowned. "I'm not sure," he said honestly. "Relieved, mostly. Glad to have you without a sword hanging over your head for the first time. But the kind of power you and Vergil were throwing around ... I'd be lying if I didn't admit it was scary. Scary but beautiful, I suppose. Like lightning."

He poked Dante with a finger. "Your turn. How are you feeling?"

Dante snorted softly. Yeah, hadn't seen that one coming. "Fuck," he said. "I don't know either. Angry and sad and relieved and tired and kinda hungry?"

He'd never been great at verbalizing, though Anders had a habit of making him want to try.

"I thought I'd be happy," he said. "Didn't think I'd lose--" Something. Vergil.

"You're always hungry," Anders said fondly, rolling to his side to check the clock.

Five more minutes before they could expect the pizza.

"It was messy," he said, after a pause. "You won one big thing and lost something just as big."

"Yeah," Dante said. He shut his eyes. It still hadn't quite landed. "It's like I'm happy and sad, so... I just land in the middle. Kinda?"

A pause. "Being here helps."

Anders' steadiness was calming.

"First thing that's felt normal all day," Anders agreed. He stretched, feeling the bruises along his back as he did. "Something to eat will help, too. And a shower when I feel like I can walk."

Dante turned his head abruptly and frowned at him. "... Are you okay?" he checked.

"Sore," Anders explained, sounding a little dismissive. "I got banged up. It happens when you go up against demons three times your size. I haven't bothered healing it yet."

"You need some old-fashioned help with that?" Dante said. "Maybe they have band-aids or lotion shit or something..."

"My pride wants me to say no," Anders said slowly. "The rest of me says that sounds amazing. I'll even take my shirt off for you."

He shrugged the shirt off to reveal a torso splotched with various bruises and scrapes, with one bright red claw mark wending along his abdomen. He looked at it in some dismay. "I thought that one missed me."

Dante winced, reaching out to trace a gentle line right above the mark. "Can you heal that?" he said. "Or are you too tired?"

Maybe he could give Anders a boost, or something...

"I'm tired," Anders said, considering it. "But maybe ... remember how we figured out you can make me stronger? We could try that, if you're up for it."

"I'm up for it if you are," Dante said, eyes flicking up at Anders. "I can give the boost, but you're gonna have to tell it where to go."

He wasn't stupid enough to think healing was even remotely a talent of his, but he knew the power that made his healing factor tick, and it was close enough to Anders'.

"I can do that much," Anders said, taking a deep breath. He sat up straighter and guided Dante's hand over his, then began to draw on their combined essences to get his skin to knit closed.

Dante was already tired; he'd figured this would tire him out more, but even as he watched Anders' skin knit together - as he directed power to slide from his body into Anders' - it felt like taking little more than a drop from the ocean.

(Anders wasn't the only one kind of thrown by how much power'd been on display yesterday.)

"Better?" he asked softly.

"Much," Anders said, letting out a long slow breath. "That was incredible. It felt like you were some giant mountain of Lyrium I could just roll around in, except without the risks."

He looked over at Dante again. "It didn't wear you out?"

Dante shook his head. "No more than making a bullet for Ivory does," he said. "Funny."

He ran his hand up gently over Anders' remaining bruises. "... I should see if they have body lotion."

"That'd be nice," Anders said lazily, faint buzz of healing working its way through his body. "And after the pizza gets here we should shower. We probably smell awful."

"I'm not sniffing you," Dante informed him, sliding off the bed and padding to the bathroom.

Truth be told, he was intensely relieved - happy, even - to be able to do something constructive for a change.

He came back shortly afterwards with a bottle of hotel body lotion and a packet of band-aids. "This is all I got," he said, crawling back onto the bed.

"More than I had on me," Anders said, slight smile curving at the corners of his mouth as he turned toward Dante. "I don't even know if I need the bandaids anymore, but the lotion'll feel good. Should I do your back, too?"

It felt good, seeing Dante fussing over him like this -- both because he appreciated the fussing, and because it meant Dante might be all right.

"Only if you want to, and maybe later," Dante said wryly, putting the band-aids aside. "I'm all healed up." Hence the tired, probably. Or at least the physical part of it.

The emotional part of the tired had sent him on an inward tailspin; it might've been bad, had the current definition of inward not included someone else.

He took the cap off the bottle and pressed some lotion into his hand. He smoothed it a little clumsily over a bruise on Anders' shoulder-- this didn't used to exactly be something he did.

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