" last night "

Chapter 28

Apprehensiveness was soon to set in when Petrov walked away from the conversation. Darion found himself slightly irate at this fact, and wound up in the same position as before he talked to Petrov. In his frustration, he didn't notice Lieutenant Begum approaching him until she nudged him with the pommel of her sword.
"What's got you so uptight, Mil?" She snorted when he quickly spun around, clearly startled. "Damn, 's just me, don't have a heart attack and die on me, man."
Darion sighed and rolled his eyes at her. "Wouldn't you like to know, мать?"
"Did you call me a bitch in Tyvian or something?"
Holding back his laughter, Darion shook his head. "No— Nonono, I called you mother, because you always need to know what's going on in everyones' lives."
Fortunately, Begum saw the humor in this, otherwise she would have likely grabbed him by the ear in a true motherly manner of discipline. "Alright then, kid, spit it out. What's up?"
"It's nothing, promise—"
"You stupid shit, something's up," she interrupted, concern leaking into her voice.
Holding his hands up in mock-surrender, Darion replied, "Alright, alright— it's nothing serious, I..." He trailed off and sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose in irritation. "This is embarrassing," he muttered. "I just have no damn idea how to—"
"Not be stupid?"
"By the Void, no—"
"Be polite to the lower guards?"
"Well, yes, but that's not the—"
"Handle grenades properly?" A grin spread across Begum's face, her eyes crinkling in amusement.
"Do you enjoy watching me suffer, asshole?" Darion groaned, laughter lacing his words. "What I was trying to say is—" He stopped mid-sentence to glare at Begum, who had opened her mouth like she was going to say something, "Don't you dare interrupt me again." Snickering, she held her tongue. "I wanna ask Windham out on an actual date, and— For fuck's sake, stop looking at me like that!"
The woman had a smile stretching ear to ear, her hands clasped together. "That's wonderful! Go for it, Mil!"
"I have no idea how to, that's the point of this ridiculously long conversation that should have ended a while ago so I can go on break."
"Oh, get over yourself, your break's not going anywhere. What's so hard about doing it? Just go up to him and ask! You're already courting, so what's the big deal?"
"Uh, we're both nervous and stupid?"
"Well, yes, but..."
"Don't finish that sentence, I swear to the Void." He sighed exasperatedly, running his hands through his hair tiredly.
"Where do you want to take him on a date?" Begum inquired, a more serious tone overcoming her voice.
Darion shrugged. "Marketplace, maybe."
She shook her head, saying, "I wouldn't do that anytime soon if I were you. A little birdie told me that there's gonna be some gang territory disputes around there soon. It's why some of the merchants have closed up shop for a few weeks; they don't want to get raided or caught in the crossfire."
"Dammit, again with the territory disputes? They're like dumb dogs. Actually, no, dogs are more civil than them."
Begum cracked a smile and shrugged. "True, I've met feral hounds nicer than a thug." Rolling her shoulder, she continued, "Perhaps take him to the pub? I heard a few of your men are going tonight, I'm sure they'd love to meet their captain's new boyfriend," she teased, smirking.
"Blow off— tell them I'll meet them at the pub a bit later than usual, will you?"
"Yeah, yeah, now go take your oh-so-precious break, you big baby," she answered with her arms crossed.
"Uh huh, love you too, Begum."

*
When his thirty minute break had become a two hour nap, none of the other guards bothered waking Darion up. Even Wesley left him alone, but considering that Blackwell's shift had long past ended, he didn't mind picking up Darion's slack. It just means he owes him a round of drinks later that night.
What ended up waking Darion up was a knock on his helmet and two paws planting themselves onto his chest, causing him to tumble out of the chair he was sitting in.
He hit the ground with a thud that knocked the wind out of his chest, and before he could even realizing what happened, a snout was pressed against his face, sniffing and licking his cheek. The hound's wagging tail repeatedly smacked the side of his thigh.
Before he could even process what was happening properly, a hand grabbed his forearm and hauled him up to his feet. The canine threaded itself between Darion's legs, stepping on his foot and panting excitedly.
Blinking to refocus his eyes, Darion finally noticed the familiar slim, masked figure in front of him; he'd be able to pick Windham out of a crowd of hundreds of other overseers anywhere.
"Caught you slacking, guard," the overseer said, trying to restrain his laughter.
Immediately, Darion quipped, "Sure, use that as your excuse to stare at me instead of doing your job, pretty boy," which prompted Windham to sputter a poor comeback that Darion couldn't make out over his laughter.
Glancing over his shoulder and then back at Windham, he quickly pulled him in for a hug and wrapped his arms tightly around his waist. After recovering from his momentary stun, Windham returned the embrace, resting his chin on top of Darion's head.
"I missed you."
"It's been like, three days, Windham."
"Okay, and? That's three days I didn't get to see your smile."
Darion swore his heart skipped a beat at that. All he could manage to do was hug Windham tighter and bury his face against his collar.
A quiet, amused hum rose from the overseer. "How have you been?"
Darion gave Windham a thumbs-up before wrapping his arm back around him.
"Am I gonna be stuck here for a while?"
A muffled, "Yep," was his answer.
"Fine by me." Darion could practically hear the smile in Windham's voice.
After a while of comfortable silence save for the clicking sound of Temperance's claws on the concrete ground, Darion glanced up and wriggled his way out of Windham's grip.
"So, uh, I have a question to ask," he began, anxiously scratching the back of his neck. A light red dusted his pale face, soon spreading to the tip of his non-burned ear.
"Oh?" Windham tilted his head to the side, intrigued.
Darion closed his eyes and sighed, trying to avoid drawing it out longer than necessary. "I was wondering if maybe you wanted to, um... go to the pub downtown with me and a few friends. I would have gone with just you, but uh, they apparently really wanna meet ya. So, um." He paused, inhaling deeply before continuing. "I guess this is my way of asking you out. Y'know. On an actual date."
Windham was silent for a moment before sliding his mask off. Darion realized he was trying to keep his smile from spreading across his entire face. (It wasn't working very well.)
The overseer quickly leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Darion's lips, not bothering to pull away until Darion had threaded his fingers through Windham's curly hair.
When he did pull away, Windham nuzzled the top of Darion's head and said, "I'd love to go with you. What time?"
Darion, who was grinning and stupidly happy, replied, "That depends, what time is it right now?"
"Um... Hey, Temperance, what time is it?"
The hound responded with a bark and pawed at the ground.
"Eight seventeen."
"I'm sorry, but did you ever happen to mention you can fucking talk to dogs?"
Windham made no comment, only shrugged before laughing and pulling his coat sleeve up. "I have a watch, you idiot."
Darion frowned. "That's significantly less impressive."
"Oh, whatever, when do we need to leave?"
"In about half an hour. Do you need to clock out or anything?"
"No, I have favors being paid back to me right about now. Should last till the morning if we play our cards right."
Darion chuckled. "Then shall we be— Wait, what about Temperance?" Temperance, who was patiently sitting at Darion's feet, looked up at him with her tail wagging back and forth. He reached down to pet her, laughing when she tried gnawing on his hand due to still cutting a few teeth.
"Oh, one moment." Windham craned his head over his shoulder. "Overholt!"
A few moments later the kid came casually strolling down the street, flipping a coin in one hand and the other hand in his coat pocket. "Whatchu want?"
Darion started at Windham, even more bewildered than when he had supposedly communicated with his hound. "How long has he been there?"
"Dunno. Kid, how long were you down there?"
"Like five minutes. Just got back from the mess hall."
"Sounds about right. Would you mind taking Temperance back to her kennel for me?"
After an incredibly long and dramatic sigh, topped with the slumping of his shoulders, Overholt straightened up and said, "Yeah, sure." He knelt down and whistled for the hound, who was taller than him at this level, to come. She came bounding over, tongue lolling out of her mouth. Overholt scratched her behind the ear, until her leg started shaking and then tugged on her harness to indicate to follow.
"Bye, suckers!" was the last thing he said before he raced the hound back to the kennels.
Windham rolled his eyes before turning back to Darion. "Anyway..."
Darion smiled, slinging his arm around Windham's waist. "Shall we be off?"
Windham returned the smile, wrapping his arm around the guard's shoulders in return. "Absolutely."