So Many Striders - Now With Illustrations!

Dirk sighs, he's starting to get sleepy again. The people on the TV are being amusingly sassy, Hal is relaxing against him heavy and warm. He's full of food and they have a mostly finish project. This is a good... the fuck time of day is it anyway?

He smiles. "That sounds good. I think Striders are predisposed toward being birds. I'm still scared one of the Daves will take a walk off of the roof one day, forgetting they don't have wings. They are crows, obviously. What kind of bird are we d'you think?"

 

Hal laughs quietly against Dirk at a particularly bitchy comment made by one of the Project Runway competitors, and sighs contentedly. He realises his eyes are closed, and forces them open again.

"So they're like Seb, then. I can see that. I guess the obvious bird to match us with is seagulls, and they do say you are what you eat, so it'd make a certain amount of sense in that way... ugh, I don't know though, maybe an albatross would be a better fit."

 

"Urgh, no, not seagulls. Noisy fuckers, and I can't really think of them without remembering the incredibly stupid ones in Finding Nemo. 'Mine? Mine? Mine?' Ha." He huffs and slumps a little, rearranging Hal to rub his other shoulder. He wraps his free arm around Hal's waist to keep him from slipping or having to use his muscles to hold himself up. "An albatross might be good. Or maybe one of those cool extinct dinosaur birds."

He's clearly getting loopy, but he's found an extremely tense feeling muscle near Hal's neck and it's likely the thing causing him problems. He digs in and gets to work.

 

Hal yawns widely, then makes a little humming sound in the back of his throat, agreeing. Those seagulls are so accurate. He shivers and goes with the rearranging, sleepy and content to let Dirk do all the work, a state that keeps growing the more his muscles are soothed, despite the way Dirk keeps blowing air on his neck and making the skin prickle. It actually feels rather nice. The arm around his waist is nice, too, a warm and solid point of contact. "Pretty sure there aren't any non-extinct dinosaur birds. Mm. Archaeopteryx or Quetzalcoatlus or something."

He sucks in a sharp breath when Dirk presses into that particularly tense muscle, waking slightly from the unexpectedly more severe pain, but it feels just so good when Dirk starts working it out that he slides into sleepiness again, letting out a long and satisfied moan.

 

"Snrk. Simmer down there buddy. This ain't that kind of massage. How dare you besmirch the name of this reputable health focused establishment." He's not quite tired enough to not feel a little awkward, but it's hard for him to focus on anything for long besides the automatic, repetitive movements of his hand. Hal's yawn infects him and he goes a bit dizzy, humming and grumbling at the end. He really needed to shove Hal off and crawl into bed. Any minute now.

 

"Mm- fuck, sorry. Feels good is all, s'not boner territory I swear." He'd be much more sorry if one, it made Dirk stop, and two, he wasn't so damn tired. His eyelids are so heavy they're starting to itch, and he lifts a (weirdly floppy-feeling) hand to rub at them, shades scooting down his nose. When he drops his hand again, he lets his eyes stay closed. It's not like he's going to fall asleep on Dirk or anything, he's got much more... control than... zzzzz....

 

Hal's breathing goes slower and deeper; he's clearly fallen asleep. All Dirk's exhausted mind can muster is a flash of irritation, he's too tired to both haul himself and Hal up. The couch is perfectly comfortable though, and the TV is a pleasant amount of white noise. He stops massaging Hal's shoulder and wraps that arm around him too before settling more deeply into the cushions and drifting off almost immediately. He'll bitch at Hal for trapping him there later, if he remembers.

 

Hal wakes up with cold feet, a sore back, and light shining directly in his eye. He grumbles, turning onto his side to get away from the glare, and the nose grip of his shades press his nostril closed. He's also in a really weird position to be lying in bed, and is on top of something warm, and oh god he fell asleep on Dirk. No wonder his back hurts. He grunts quietly and pushes his shades up his nose, then levers himself into a more upright position, his back protesting in several places as he does. His shoulders are nice and loose at least, thanks to Dirk's... ministrations, but he really wishes he'd managed to stay awake for long enough that Dirk could get his back done too. And for long enough that he could actually go to his own bed rather than literally falling asleep on top of Dirk.

He chews his lip thoughtfully.

It was actually really sweet of Dirk to just let him sleep there, it can't have been comfortable for Dirk to have someone of roughly the same weight lying on top of him for however long they were sleeping, but he can't remember any attempts to move him - and Dirk is really quite strong, so if he truly wanted to get Hal off he'd have managed it. To move Hal off, that is. Not get him off. That implies something different and is not what he meant. Thinking about Dirk getting him off is weird and creepy and not in the spirit of brotherly affection at all, even if it has a certain appeal.

It-! Oh. Yeah. He was going to devote some time to considering his feelings for Dirk, and he might as well do it now. He draws his knees up to his chest and turns around, still sat between Dirk's legs, to face him. He's going to do this logically, which means careful contemplation of the things he would presumably like to do with someone he had romantic interest in, but not with someone he considered merely a close platonic sibling.

If Dirk was in a peaceful frame of mind, and he and Hal had touched enough to desensitise him to a lot of contact, would he hypothetically enjoy cuddling Dirk? He's pretty sure he would, but the same also feels true for Roxy, Davepeta, Davesprite, and Dave. Not so much Arquius, Rose, or his big bro, but he doesn't have as strong and positive a relationship with them. He and Arquius clash a lot, and he hasn't talked to Rose or Bro anywhere near as often as the others. Dirk almost, kind of kissed the side of his head once, when they were sat on the floor and talking about feelings. At the time, he liked it more than he was prepared to admit. He'd like to return it some time, too. Still, kisses could be platonic depending on their positioning.

Hal thinks he might enjoy kissing Dirk on the lips, but lacks the data to be sure. Dirk is, of course, lying right there in front of him, but experimenting without prior consent would be creepy and gross and wrong. The potential to enjoy it might be enough, though - he certainly can't imagine enjoying kissing any of the Daves that way, or Roxy. That might be because of his knowledge of what Dave's bro was like, though, and a sexuality thing. Would he be interested in kissing Jake on the lips? A quick study points to yes, but if he were in the same situation as he is now with Dirk, but with Jake, sitting between his legs while he slept, he can't imagine himself being tempted to try it out.

... Crap. He totally has a thing for Dirk.

 

Dirk's glasses had migrated half way up his head and were hopelessly tangled in his hair. His shirt had ridden up but he wasn't cold until just a second ago. He also wasn't awake until just a second ago when something started jostling him. He frowned and grumbled, "M'na a pillow." Whatever had woken him stopped happening, and he slipped back into sleep for a bit, but it was fucking cold damn it. He made sleep plans to take a hot shower for most of the morning and then suddenly, in the way of dreams, it was already happening. He sighs happily in his sleep.

 

Hal's heart does something weird and warm and throbby when Dirk sighs happily while being fast asleep, and even if he hadn't already acknowledged-slash-realised his feelings for Dirk tend towards the romantic, that would have cinched it. He gets to his feet on the couch, walking down to the end closer to Dirk's feet to step off it onto the ground, wincing as the stretch down pulls at his stiff back. Moving around, he picks up his pizza box, which still contains three slices, and heads into the kitchen to stick them in the microwave. He can apologise for sleeping on Dirk with food.

When the pizza's done, he sticks it back in the box to save on washing, and carries it back through to the main room, reaching down to shake Dirk lightly by the shoulder. "Hey Dirk, it's morning, time to get up yo."

 

"It's... wha." He dreamed he'd woken up, he hates that. Ever since he'd been forced to dream like a normal person he's been struggling with sleep, both getting enough and dealing with regular dreams. But he's awake now, kind of, and Hal is in his room? Wait. "When did m'alarm clock get so handsy?" He shifts blurrly and oh, he's on the couch. There's half a cold burger in arm's reach of his current position. The smell of some other food, pizza maybe, makes him realize how hungry he is and he flops a hand toward the dubious left overs.

 

He steps back, snorting in badly-concealed amusement. Dirk's fucking hilarious when he's sleepy, but he's also rather unlikely to be up for having jokes directed at him, so Hal holds back on making a comment about handsy alarm clocks and what they'd reach for. When Dirk flops a hand towards the leftovers, he drops the pizza box in his lap instead. "You might like this a bit more than cold burger, I blasted it in the microwave for a bit to make it more edible."

 

A warm box hits Dirk right in the crotch and pizza smell wafts over his face. He redirects his attention to the new target, and manages to hoist himself half way up before shoving day old pizza in his face. Choking because of eating lying down would be a stupid way to die.

"Nmf." He says intelligently. "Ow'er you?" Manners achieved.

 

Hal sits on the floor in front of the middle of the couch, leaning his back against it and tugging the untouched bread sticks from last night forward. Breakfast of leftovers is a go, although he's still got no idea what time it actually is. He rips one of the bread sticks in half, twisting to drop one half on the pizza box Dirk is eating from (and wincing when he pulls something in his back further than it's willing to go.)

"Mh, been better? My back's still kind of achy."

 

Last night slowly comes back to him as he wakes up. He sees Hal moving gingerly and wincing, and remembers that they fell asleep before he could work on Hal's back. "I'll fix that today, don't want you coming down with chronic back pain like your's truly." He swallows a mouth full of pizza and yawns. "Let me just wake up and hygiene first. Does this happen often or is it just from hunching over so long yesterday?" There is a breadstick, he shoves most of the thing in his mouth at once.

 

Shoving his half of the bread stick into his mouth, Hal chews on it, letting the end hang out until he's eaten enough that it can fit in. As he does, he rips a second apart, offering half up over his shoulder to Dirk instead of twisting round again, and waits until he has an empty mouth before replying, because he wasn't raised by animals (or, well, anyone, but that's not the point.) "I figured I'd just stand under the shower until the water pounds it out, but hey if you're offering then I'm up for it." he rips his half of the second bread stick in half again before continuing. "My legs and arms tend to get stiff if I stay in the same position for too long, but I think that's pretty normal for humans over the age of thirteen? Not usually my back though, so it's probably just because of yesterday."

 

As soon as he's eaten enough food to calm his stomach, Dirk leverages himself up and shuffles into the bathroom. It's only after he's stripped and hopped in the shower that he remembers he didn't see if Hal needed the bathroom first. Hm. He'll try to keep it short.

Hal probably doesn't need any kind of physical therapy like the various sprites did, but it does seem like new muscles will be delicate and need attention. Over the past few months Dirk has learned almost as much about how bodies are put together as he once knew about robots; someone needed to be in charge of physical therapy and both Hal and Dave have significant aversion to casual touch.

Dirk thinks about Hal, thinks about how his back is less sore but his neck feels weird from sleeping on the couch. Thinks about how it was kind of nice to just be near someone for a little while. He really needs to get Roxy and some of the others in on this snuggle action, he misses it more than he'd like to admit.

A quick 40 minutes later (lightening fast by his standards) he wraps himself in a towel and and heads to his room, calling out to Hal, "Hey, bathrooms free."

 

For the first ten minutes Dirk's in the bathroom, Hal continues to eat the bread sticks, ripping them into smaller and smaller pieces as he gets towards being full. The next ten minutes he spends cross-legged on the couch, playing candy crunch. Then he tidies up the shit from their meal. He spends a little time hesitating before putting the remainder of Dirk's cold burger in the trash, because it's Wasting Food that's perfectly edible if kind of gross, and he- they- Dirk didn't exactly have an excess of food lying around back when they were one person. There's lots of places to go get food now, though, and their big bro is a famous movie producer, they have money and it's fine to dump gross food that could still be eaten.

He's just heading back out into the main room when Dirk walks past in just a towel. He's dripping wet, and wearing nothing but a towel, and his hair is down and damp and there's a bead of water rolling down the back of his neck, and he's wearing nothing but a towel, and Hal is staring so hard and he's so glad Dirk didn't notice him there because he's pretty sure he'd be staring even if he'd been spotted. When Dirk gets into his room, at least, he's finally able to look away, heading to the bathroom for a 15-minute shower because seriously Dirk what the fuck do you do in there for hours on end, he can't remember and kind of wants to ask. Anyway, 15 minutes after Dirk walked by in just a fucking towel, seriously, Hal does the same, heading to his own room for a clean change of clothes.

 

It takes him about half an hour to get dressed and fuss with his hair until it stays put in it's rad, gravity defying configuration. He has a pretty long list of things to do, but none that are time sensitive at the moment. There are a few messages waiting for him on his computer; package deliveries, an update from ARquius, etc. The only thing that seems important is the blinking pesterchum message from Roxy. He's going to answer that, and he's going to try and make things right with her. Today. It's happening.

He sits down to type, lets his hands hover over the keyboard for about thirty seconds and... stands to go knock on Hal's door. The dude is in pain and needs much more immediate attention. Right after this though. For sure.

"Hal? You ready for me to help you with your back?"

 

Hal's dressing and grooming routine consists of brushing his teeth (done in the bathroom), brushing and blow drying his hair (not because of fussiness, but so he can tie it up in its stupid little ponytail without it dripping down his neck the rest of the day), and pulling on clothes, the outer items of which are a pair of almost neon red, soft socks, a pair of grey sweatpants, and a long-sleeved black tshirt. Mmm, comfort. He wakes his computer up from sleep mode and sets his phone to charge, and is two paragraphs into a reply to an intensive world-building roleplay he has with Davepeta (Hal's character speaks only in rhyme, theirs speaks only in puns. But really, they spent days on the world-building before even starting character creation) when Dirk knocks on the door. He heads over to open it, and is definitely not disappointed that Dirk's dressed now because that would be stupid.

"Yeah bro, I'm ready to get the pain train off the tracks. Let's derail that fucker and save my spine, which is tied to the train tracks like some wild west heroine."