Wherein Nasir tries not to send his boyfriend into a rage [Closed]

[calledmenasir]

WHO| Nasir and Agron
WHAT| After having some fun, Nasir's visitor, Agron, presses for more information. He doesn't like what he learns. Nasir regrets everything.
WHEN| The night the tributes' visitors arrive
WHERE| Nasir's room
WARNINGS| Pillow talk (it all takes place after, nothing happens in the post), curses and offensive slurs, violence against furniture

Faizan had been separated from them for the night, which was for the best but still unsettled Nasir. He did not trust his captors but he assumed they had more sense than to kill his brother and expect him to still fight for them. He had to assume that or he would worry himself until his nerves were raw.

Fortunately for him, Agron was allowed to return with Nasir to his room and he had proved pleasantly distracting. Nasir wrapped his arms around him and for the first time he had to hold back a laugh. He had missed Agron-- and this-- feeling his weight press down on him and having him near.

"Do you still believe this dream?" Nasir smiled, running his hands down Agron's back.

Comments

[quarrels]

For Agron it has been less than a day since they were in this very same position - together in each other's arms, breathing the same air and pressed close enough to be nearly as one. In the wake of his brutal (justifiably so, Agron thinks) assault on Castus Agron had been a violent storm of emotion, all too ready to fall for Nasir's temptation instead of taking it out further on those around him.

He had been no less on edge today, surrounded as he was by alien sights and sounds that had made no sense at all. The only thing that had kept Agron in line hadn't been the scattering of Peacekeepers, harried and fraught as they were, but the quiet presence of Nasir at his side. A calming, cooling pillar of normality amidst a sea of riddles and dreams.

There, in that very room Nasir was much the same. Their environment was still strange; the bed seemed to be made of the richest material Agron had ever touched, the air tasted of cold metal - it was enough to keep Agron unsettled and suspicious. The smile he returned at Nasir's question was considerably less bright, even as he squeezed a rough, warm hand against one of the thighs wrapped about his torso.

"You stand more convincing," He admitted, still breathless, and the smile turned teasing. "Now that I have evidence enough to know you flesh -- and blood --" Ducking his head, he punctuated each word first with a kiss against Nasir's jaw and then another against the warm pulse of his neck.

But there were too many strange thoughts to allow him to fall back in to the easy comfort of enjoying the taste of Nasir against his lips. He lifted his head and slightly eased his weight away, propping himself up on one forearm planted to one side of Nasir's shoulder as he frowned down at the man beneath him.

"But the rest of this land stands no less a riddle."

[calledmenasir]

This time Nasir did laugh, light, almost breathless, but a laugh and something that no longer felt as foreign as it would have but a day ago. He lay back and savored each press of Agron's lips and the touch of his hand against thigh until they were removed.

Nasir lowered his legs from around Agron as the man moved but still craving touch, he lay his hand across Agron's chest, moving it until his palm rested over his heart.

"One I have spent weeks in attempt to unravel." Nasir did not want to think about it. He did not want to consider what he was being forced to do, nor did he wish Agron would learn of it. Yet the latter seemed impossible. He was bound to learn eventually. Someone would let something slip and at the same time, though he desired to protect Agron, Nasir also wanted him to know. Wouldn't it be best he discovered the truth now when they had risen to such heights?

But...

"Place it from thought for yet a moment longer."

[quarrels]

"Weeks?"

The word registered and Agron drew his head back sharply. Time has passed, Nasir had said to Agron and Faizan earlier, but Agron had simply assumed it was a matter of mere moments. There were many things about his abrupt arrival in this city that hadn't made sense but the idea that Nasir had been here for weeks somehow seemed more incredulous than any of it put together.

"But -- hours ago you were yet within my arms in Sinuessa--?" He attempted to sound out his thoughts, words trailing off as he mind raced ahead in stumbling bounds to conclusions that made painfully little sense. The sweat on his brow and his back seemed rapidly cooler now, freezing almost as he clenched his jaw in a deeper frown. Once again Agron found himself confused far beyond what he could bear - and the only one who seemed to have the answers here was the smaller man beneath him.

"How many days have passed since you were imprisoned here?" He demanded as he propped himself up fully on one hand to look down at Nasir.

[calledmenasir]

Nasir reminded himself that he needed to be more careful with his words. He was used to not guarding himself when he was with Agron yet now it was a necessity, one that Agron would not appreciate but would have avoided this had Nasir taken more care.

He had wanted but a moment more of enjoyment before discussing this.

"I no longer know." Nasir had never been taught, had barely learned to count and after his defeat in the arena, he had no mind for it.

"I believe they took me two weeks past. Do not ask me how it is possible that I lay in your arms hours ago. There is much I do not understand. They have taken people from the future as well, from a span of years almost beyond imagining. Time holds little meaning to them in that regard. For you it has been hours, for me it has been--" some time "weeks since Sinuessa."

A lie, one that felt bitter on his tongue, but one that above all others had to be told. The distaste in his expression at speaking it could be excused by their situation. He hoped it would be.

[quarrels]

"The cock on them, attempting to steal you away from loving arms!" Agron fiercely exclaimed, now increasingly more incensed by the mental image that Nasir's words cultivated: the man he loves dearest, stolen away over miles by an unfamiliar and unexpected enemy. Taken against his will, taken against Agron's will.

Another burst of righteous anger swelled in his chest and Agron sank lower again, falling back down to settle against the sleek lines of Nasir's body once more. The idea of losing Nasir was unbearable - the fact that he had somehow lost him already was even worse.

"And to what end?" He cupped a hand against Nasir's flushed cheek with one thumb tracing the familiar arch of his cheek bone. "What purpose do these fucks have, bringing you so far?"

[calledmenasir]

Agron would learn. Sooner or later he would learn. It was best he heard the news from Nasir's lips.

Nasir swept his hands over Agron's shoulders and up his neck before burying his fingers in his lover's hair.

"The same purpose for which the Romans enslaved you. They brought me here to fight in the arena for their amusement."

It was not the worst they could have asked of him, as he knew. Dying had been, as expected, excruciating and he could not recall a worse experience-- physically. Emotionally he had suffered worse, a fact that Agron did not know and would not for some time.

To be parted from Agron weighed on Nasir heavily with each passing day but at least he knew that he lived. He would have Agron remain alive over the course of his stay here.

[quarrels]

For all the solid reassurance of Nasir's hands - the skimming of the bare flesh of his neck, the gentle tug of fingers through his hair - there was nothing he could possibly have done to make his words any easier to hear. The effect on Agron was instantaneous; his face falls in to a tumult of emotion as a thick, freezing wave of dread and anger washed through the hollow of his chest. How long had he spent trying to free Duro from Batiatus's ludus? And what had been the final price of his efforts?

For a moment Agron struggled to form words beyond the thick knot of emotion that seemed to have lodged in his throat. The hand at Nasir's cheek felt frozen in place, forgotten or unable to be moved, as he stared uncomprehendingly down at the face he held.

" -- You are fucking gladiator?" He finally managed, expression full of the threat of a storming rage.

[calledmenasir]

Nasir ran his fingers down Agron's neck, knowing that the comfort of his touch was not enough. He was worried and angry and Nasir shared in those feelings though he could admit only to anger.

"In all but name. They call us tributes." The next part would be a difficult message to convey. Nasir himself had not believed it until it happened to him. "When we fall in the arena, they breathe life into us once more and we return from Hades. I will not leave this world."

Nasir held little hope that the news would calm Agron.

He took Agron's face in his hands. "When we are parted I will return to you."

The people of Panem may have been able to wrest him from Agron's arms but they would not keep him from them.

[quarrels]

Tributes, returning from Hades... Nasir might as well have said that the sky was pink and that fog could kill you quicker than a sword to the gut, for all the sense it made. He didn't even bother to try processing it - his mind was too full of one very particular thought that made his blood simultaneously freeze with dread and boil with anger.

Nasir, a gladiator.

He pulled away with a snarling grunt of frustration, away from the strong hands that held his face, pushing them away with one hand as if he they were nothing. Suddenly enveloped in his own anger - in his own memories of hos much he had hated the idea of Duro fighting alone in the arena, without Agron for protection - it seemed as if he were suddenly caught up in his own untouchable and unstoppable storm of emotion. Nasir being enslaved once again had bad enough but the idea that he might fall, alone and in pain and with a crowd baying for blood was enraging - and painful - beyond words.

Away from the warm, damp press of Nasir's body beneath his the room - the cell - feels colder. Numbly Agron moved to the edge of the bed, hands blindly gripping at the edge of the plush mattress until his knuckles turned white, head bowed and shoulders hunched as he stared unseeingly at some spot on the floor.

"A fucking gladiator," He spat, every muscle rigid and tensed as he sat, naked and furious, before he suddenly twisting as the realisation settled. "And you have fought in their arena before now?"

[calledmenasir]

Nasir sat up and crawled beside Agron, placing his hands on his shoulders. He didn't reply immediately and that should have been answer enough-- the moment of hesitation before he spoke.

"Yes."

Agron didn't seem to have registered what else Nasir had said, not that he could fault him for it. But Nasir knew Agron would latch onto that one word and not release it until the fire inside him had run its course and dimmed to embers.

"Agron, I will not fall in the arena." Not permanently. He had already died once but that was a fine distinction and not one that Agron was yet ready to hear. "Open ears and listen to me."

But he knew that it was pointless to urge Agron to calm down. His taut muscles, his words and the voice with which he spoke them, and more than that Nasir's knowledge of the man all spoke to an impending outburst of rage and violence.

At least Nasir didn't care for his furnishings. Still, he would like a bed to sleep on for the night.

[quarrels]

It was never going to take much to trigger the explosive outpouring of rage that had begun to bottle itself in his chest, but it was that moment of hesitation before Nasir's yes that truly did it. Nasir could have said nothing else except for that single word and Agron would have felt it like a spear through his chest.

He pushed Nasir's hands from his shoulders with another growl - guttural, pained almost in the depth and scope of the overwhelming rage at the idea of Nasir in the arena - as he rose to his feet. Naked and still traced with a glistening, gleaming sheen of sweat Agron lashed out - fingers brushed the delicate glass work of a decanter of water and automatically latched on. A single item in the room for Agron to exert his rage on, he gripped the thin neck of the water jug and threw it blindly, savagely, with a flex of his muscles and a snarl of hate, across the room and against the far wall.

But the smash and shatter of the glass as it fell hard against the unforgiving wall of Nasir's room was disappointingly underwhelming - there was no satisfaction to be found in the way it broke, and Agron curled both fists in to a ball as he turned to find the next target.

A chair - strange and uncomfortable, seemingly fashioned of the same iron as a blade. It too is swept up in Agron's hard fingers, but this one required more effort than the decanter. He swung it madly, sending it in a violent tumble to smash its way in to another far corner of the room with a roar.

[calledmenasir]

Nasir had always known Agron to be a violent, rage driven man, and he loved him for it. He loved him for how he fought on the battlefield: mad and wild and focused entirely on burying his blade in Roman flesh. But this was not the battlefield and on more than one occasion Agron's anger had brought trouble down on them-- and between them. Right now, Nasir wanted nothing more than to bring forth the tender side that only he knew, the one with arms held open for him and who had told him, once, that his heart would beat only for him.

By the look of it, Nasir would not see that side of the man for some time. He watched as first glass shattered then the chair crashed against the wall. Nasir pushed himself up off the bed but kept his distance. He knew Agron would never hurt him but it was best to give him space while he was like this.

"Is it intent to break all in this room?" Nasir was harsher than he meant but he was tired of this. He was tired of holding back his own anger so he wouldn't provoke Agron's. He was tired of that failing. He was tired of Agron not stopping to listen to him.

He stared at Agron, not caring that he was naked and not caring that he was trying to stare Agron down while physically looking up at him.

[quarrels]

Agron turned on his heel, eyes searching for the next poor inanimate object for him to exert his wrath upon but instead finding his eyes catching on Nasir.

"Is it Jupiter's fucking intent to have me break my oath?" He thundered in reply, eyes white-edged with fury as his gaze latched uncompromisingly on to Nasir's. By Agron's count it was less than a day since he stood in a similar fury before his lover, declaring that the gods themselves could not take Nasir away from him. "He will not prove my words false," He threatened as he took a step towards Nasir, finger upraised if it was Nasir himself that he reprimanded. "I will tear the fuck from the heavens myself before I see you stand alone on arena sand!"

[quarrels]

His kisses were harder, his grip was just a little bit tighter. Tenderness was replaced by fierceness and a furious determination; every touch of Agron's skin against Nasir's was fuelled by possessiveness and the drive to make sure Nasir, of all people, knew just how much he wanted Nasir for himself. And himself alone.

When they were done and Agron had taken a moment to catch his breath and still the hammering of his heart against his chest, he rolled on to his back with a sigh. Pulling Nasir on top of him - draping the smaller man over his own broad chest and holding him close with arms pulled tight around his shoulders - was an easy feat.

"You change subject too easily," He grumbled between kisses, more a criticism of his own inability to withstand Nasir's wiles than any real manipulation on Nasir's part.

[calledmenasir]

Nasir pressed a long kiss to Agron's lips to silence him, only speaking when he pulled away from his mouth. "Do you not find present subject pleasing?" He asked.

He brushed his hair back behind his ear so it wouldn't fall into Agron's face as he kissed his jaw.

"Tell me, how can I ensure you do?"

This was preferable to the conversation that was sure to follow now that Agron was regaining his senses. And this time Nasir was too tired to distract in the same manner as before. He could only hope that Agron was similarly exhausted and unable to tear apart the room as he had.

And by the gods, Nasir just wanted to hold onto this. Knowing Agron though, he was determined to tear their moment of peace apart again.

[quarrels]

One hand anchored itself on the solid flesh of Nasir's hip - had he grown a little broader in the supposed weeks that they had been apart? Or perhaps Agron imagined it - while the other hand echoed the same movements as Nasir's as Agron reached up to touch Nasir's hairline. Thick fingers with short, ripped nails trailed the same line, tucking away hair that was already pretty well tucked away thanks to Nasir, but doing it anyway for the sake of it. The hand followed down, along the curve of Nasir's throat, to find a familiar home at the nape of Nasir's neck where it rubbed meaningless circles amidst Nasir's kisses.

"Very fucking pleasing, as I ever find you," He assured in low, breathless tones with eyes half-lidded with comfort despite the silent threat of the world beyond their four walls continuing to prowl restlessly in the back of Agron's mind. The fingers at Nasir's hip dug meaningfully in for emphasis as he added: "You know I have burn with questions in deep need of answer, yet you ply me with kisses! You have me at serious fucking disadvantage - you possess my every weakness."

[calledmenasir]

Nasir rested one of his hands on Agron's chest and ran it up to his shoulder then down again, soothing him with fingers and lips as he trailed kisses across Agron's jaw while he talked. But at Agron's last words he stopped.

Nasir did not possess every weakness but he did know of them all, present and future. Agron did not.

"As you possess mine," he said but his voice was a little unsure, not as confident or teasing as it had been moments ago.

Nasir moved in to kiss Agron's lips. His nails raked at the skin on Agron's shoulder to further the distraction, both for his lover and himself. Nasir did not intend for it to last long but he was caught up in Agron's taste, in the fingers stroking his nape and those digging into his hip. If he tried to forget, it wasn't that difficult to be happy for this one moment.

With his fingertips, Nasir smoothed the scratch marks he'd left behind.

"Promise you will stay in bed and I will see questions answered."

[quarrels]

A scratch followed by a gentle touch - it made sense, on some deep level. So much of their world was made up of pleasure bound tightly with pain, and the soothing press of Nasir's fingertips felt a thousand times more loving because of it. And Agron loved him all the more for it.

"Words from mouth are lovingly received yet tone again gives cause enough to trouble heart," he murmured against Nasir's kiss with a frown, then pulled the smaller man away to hold him at arm's length, all the better to carefully watch for any sign of Nasir's tell-tale guilty expression. "Promise that answers given are forged with truth and perhaps I will consider terms!"

[calledmenasir]

Nasir wanted to stay close to Agron, the whole of him spread out over Agron's body, but at his lover's insistence he drew back.

Agron wanted to hear the truth but Nasir knew they would regret it once it was spoken. That was why he'd held back since Agron arrived. Too much lay before Agron, unknown and unimagined. Nasir had no desire to inflict more pain on him, with little opportunity as he had to stop it.

Though if he could be convinced not to leave with Crixus...

Then how would their lives have changed? Would they still have lived?

Nasir's fingers stilled and his smile fell away from his face as his brow knit. He could feel his own expression change and knew it was too late to recover from his body's betrayal.

Agron didn't need to know but Nasir still felt that compulsion to tell, almost as strong as the one to conceal.

"I promise," Nasir finally said. He would demand something in return if he knew Agron could hold to his own promise.

And if Nasir had to withhold his answer in the end, it would not be the first promise broken between them.

[quarrels]

He held Nasir's gaze a moment longer, watching carefully - waiting - to see if that familiar guilty expression of Nasir's would yield anything more. When it was clear that Agron would have to put his fears and questions in to words he looked away with a hissed sigh of frustration.

"Nasir..."

He pulled the smaller man closer again, both hands on Nasir's waist, but this time Agron manhandled him right up and over his body until Nasir was straddling his hips. He wanted him to both be close and at enough of a distance to see him properly, and this was perfect - Agron with a clear view of his man but with the comfortable weight across his hips, Nasir in plain sight above and all the more exposed against Agron's suspicious eye.

"Do not think I know so little of the man I love that I stand blind to his heart. Your mouth stops short of words I know you yearn to break..."

Agron cut himself short, expression twisting in to a sharp grimace as he instantly struggled to shed his own fears of what Nasir must be hiding. His mind raced ahead, suddenly picturing the very worst.

"Put tongue to purpose. If you have had another man's cock then fucking form words..."

[calledmenasir]

Another man's cock? That was what Agron thought? Of all the things that could have gone wrong in this place Agron thought that but weeks after arriving he had fallen into bed with someone?

Since he'd met Agron, Nasir had never lain with another man, and while his eyes had strayed that was the only transgression he was guilty of-- and he'd felt that guilt like a hard rock in his stomach for days upon days after Agron had left him. He could never...

Nasir leaned over Agron, bringing himself closer than perhaps the other man wanted him. He took Agron's face in his hands.

"I told you once that I have not broken trust with you and I hold true..." Nasir's firm voice trailed off as soon as he reached the word 'true' and realized what he'd done.

No, he hadn't told Agron that, not as far as Agron knew but the words had come out of his mouth before reason could stop them.

Nasir froze over Agron. His expression went blank, suppressing the horror he felt at how quickly he'd let it all fall apart.

[quarrels]

Nasir's hands took his face and Agron's frown flushed hot with stubborness as he clung fast to his accusation - of course, the suspicion sounded wrong and ugly as soon as he put it in to words and the very idea made him tense with fear, but they were words he had to say. There was surely no other explanation for how Nasir had been acting - those little telltale signs that he was keeping something painful and unhappy back, the way he had been so peculiarly insistent on having Agron's hands upon him...

And now, Nasir's words made even less sense than before. Agron slowly wrapped his fingers around Nasir's wrists, pulling the hands from his face, and propped himself up on his elbows with a mystified frown.

"Words newly formed in ear," He replied, eyes narrowing. Nasir's expression spoke more than even his accidental reveal could ever say. "You have never broken such with me before!"

[calledmenasir]

Nasir sat back when Agron rose, though he remained straddling the man. He curled his fingers into his palms but he did not pull them away.

"Agron..." Nasir's tone was careful, almost warning. Don't pursue this. Don't ask me. But it was too late.

He had promised he wouldn't lie and Agron would not let this go.

"I have. You do not recall because you have not yet seen the day I broke them. It has been more than weeks since I was with you in Sinuessa. For me, days have passed that you have not borne witness to." Nasir spoke slowly, giving Agron time to process but also delaying the moment when Agron would come at him with more questions that Nasir could not answer, no matter how he pressed.

[quarrels]

Disbelief was his first instinctive reaction - the idea that Nasir might somehow be ahead of him in time was as ludicrous as... well, the fact that they were here in Panem. Which, given that they were in Panem, suddenly seemed no less ludicrous but somehow... confusingly real. And so much had happened in the past day that Agron was still not entirely convinced it wasn't a dream after all.

"Fuck the gods!" He exclaimed, releasing Nasir's wrists and falling moodily back upon the mattress to stare up at the ceiling as if the man perched on his lap were the one to blame. "Is every word from mouth no more than fucking riddle now?"

[calledmenasir]

"Continue to press subject and hear more riddles. Let it fall and ease troubled mind." Not that Nasir believed that Agron would though he hoped.

Nasir ran his hands over Agron's chest, his first instinct to soothe and draw Agron back instead of glaring like a petulant child at the ceiling.

"Yet words of the impossible would sooner come true than for me to lay with another."

He didn't expect this would change anything. Agron would return, he would see Nasir with Castus and, instead of believing that the both of them would have run into each other on their way to their respective leaders, he would reach a conclusion that would cause him to turn from Nasir, if only for a short time. But maybe, if he recalled this, it would move him to forgiveness and understanding more quickly.

Nasir bent over Agron and kissed his collarbone.