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Nimble feet pattered from the dirt to the tarp as Gaius slipped through the tent flaps with his box of goodies in tow.
This was a delivery he had long awaited; weeks had passed since Anna tipped him off to the shipment of candies she was anticipating, and little else had occupied his thoughts. It had taken incredible willpower for him to resist the temptation of the foreign sweets within the package, but he finally made it back to the privacy of his own tent. Luckily, his bunkmate Lon’qu was gone, probably practicing the sword like always. While he made for a tidy roommate, Lon’qu often complained about the oppressive scent of sugar hanging in their living quarters, likening it to those tacky bead curtains owned by middle-aged men who’d lost their edge. Or something. Suffice to say, it was better for him to be gone for this.
His mind singing the redheaded peddler’s praises, Gaius wasted no time in clearing the center of the tent for the package’s unboxing, shoving bags and papers to and fro. He plunked himself down on the floor and used a knife to cut the bindings on the box, hunger consuming his consciousness, mouth already watering at the thought of the delicate chocolates and sugar crystals tucked inside. He could almost imagine their shapes on his tongue, their aroma rising into the canvas over his head and permeating the temporary shelter.
No longer able to hold back, Gaius jammed his hand into the box and grabbed a fistful of soft fabric.
The thief’s conscious mind hurriedly shushed his unconscious mind, dimming his gluttonous fantasy. With hesitation, he drew back his hands and pulled out multiple pastel pink garments. First, he noticed the gritty feeling of the lacey fabric rubbing together in his grip, a telltale characteristic of fancy clothes. Second, he identified two matching pieces that were clearly meant to be slipped over one’s legs. Third, he discovered two dainty little bows that turned out to be front-and-center adornments on what could only be a set of smallclothes.
These were not his beautiful sweets.
These were not his beautiful treats.
This was… lingerie?
Gaius’ back slumped as the disappointment finally caught up to his spine. Weeks. Weeks, he’d been waiting for this, and his beloved candy treasure trove turned out to be underwear he didn’t ask for. It was like every holiday party he could remember from his youth—clothes. It was always clothes. The only difference was, now he wasn’t just unhappy with what he received, he was also unhappy with what he himself had bought. It was a rotten feeling, he thought, rubbing the lace trim on the stockings between his fingers. And he had nothing to show for it but the lingerie itself.
The lingerie. He shifted his gaze to stare at the sock-like stretch of material in his hand. It wasn’t a bad set of underwear, really. Nice color, felt good on the skin, meticulously detailed. In better circumstances, he could even see himself wearing it.
Gaius sat like that for a few more minutes, letting his thoughts bounce quietly together. Then he got up to search for a mirror.
“Hey, Gaius, did you check the—”
The question answered itself as Gaius turned around to face an interloper who was far more startled than him. “Come on, Red. You walk in on someone in their skivvies and you’re the one who’s embarrassed?” He gave a little pose to accentuate the occasion. In spite of everything, the look worked. The lingerie was not exactly fighting his body, and he had to admit he looked good. He’d hit that. It’d be himself, but he’d do it. Anna probably wasn’t even freaked out, she just wasn’t prepared to see so much hotness all at once.
Anna broke into a grin before answering, her eyes tracing a path up down his body with little subtlety. “Who wouldn’t need to catch their breath after seeing this?” (Knew it.) “So, um. That package you got was meant for someone else.”
Gaius popped into a different pose for freshness. “Dunno what you’re talking about, Red. I’d forego candy for fancy, impractical underwear any day.”
“Well, I guess you just did, so that’s true.”
Gaius dropped the pose he was getting ready. “Huh?”
Anna raised her eyebrows apologetically—a look bred from the pity of having to break bad news and the disappointment of having to explain rules that should have been obvious. “Normally I could just take back the lingerie, send it back to the person who actually ordered it, and exchange that for your candies, but not anymore. Not after it’s touched your nether realms. That’d be unsanitary.” The finger that normally rested on her chin waggled aggressively in the air to silence Gaius’ incoming protests. “So instead, what’ll have to happen is, I’ll apologize to the other party and get ahold of a new set of this stuff for them. Then when that order arrives, you get your candy back from them. Just to be fair.”
“Eugh.” Gaius gave a low whistle like it’d change her mind. “Making me wait even longer? That’s a rough deal.”
Anna was already on her way out of the tent. “Well,” she tossed back over her shoulder, “if you ask about our return policy next time, maybe you’ll get what you want on time, hmm?”
“Hey, wait a minute—” Seeing the merchant poke her head back in through the tent flap, Gaius gestured to his beautifully adorned body as an attempt at explanation. “What am I supposed to do with this?”
“Oh, that’s yours now, so whatever you can think of. That’s something, right?” And with one last loving glance at the scantily-clad thief, she left without waiting for a reply.
He was left alone now. Left to simmer in his own folly—the fool of the post office, the laughingstock of all who saw him. Or something. It really wasn’t that big a deal, although being stuck without the candy was annoying. He looked down at his body, still gorgeous. The lingerie definitely belonged to him now, and it would be wasteful to throw away something he’d only gotten by accident. You break it, you buy it, after all! (Even if he didn’t buy things very often.)
Whatever he could think of, huh?
“Hey, check it out, Sunshine, I’m a dark mage too.”
Tharja had already prepared her best look of disgust before she turned her gaze upward, but it turned out to be insufficient for the sight of the honey-tongued burglar lounging on her table in frilly underwear. She nearly hissed, but real words came to her lips first. “What in the seven hells is this? What are you doing?”
His smirk basically said all that needed saying, but he kept talking anyway. “I got this outfit when I used a Second Seal, and I thought it looked so much like yours, we must be the same class now! Had to get my own cape, though.” He fluttered the blanket tied around his neck as if expecting applause. Shockingly, he got none.
He did get a world-class eyeroll, though. “I’m going to ignore that,” Tharja groaned. “You don’t even have the sheer fabric that’s supposed to go over it, so you’re wrong anyway, but I’m going to ignore it, because my time is better spent doing real research than humoring your idiotic jokes.” And with that, she returned to the tome lying open in front of her.
And of course, that was no escape. “Come on, Sunshine! Have a little heart!” Tharja was forced to look up as Gaius wiggled closer, an odd maneuver for someone posed on their side like a sultry jazz singer on an expensive piano. “There’s gotta be something you can teach me about the ol’ hexcraft.”
“Are you out of your mind? How tight is that headband?”
“Tight enough for me to learn, sweet cheeks.”
“I doubt that,” the sorcerer muttered before making another attempt to retreat into her book. “This is too complex for someone like you. It’d fly straight over your tiny orange head.”
“Oh, come on. There’s something out there, right? I’m sure there’s a…”
When the end of the sentence didn’t arrive, Tharja glanced over to see why. She encountered the smuggest, most shit-eating grin she had ever seen in her life—a definite omen of disaster. “No,” she began, “no. Stop. Do not. Whatever you’re going to say, don’t. I can’t promise—”
“I’m sure there’s a pletharja of things you could teach me.”
Tharja glared. She glared harder than she ever had in her entire life, eyes boring deep into the soul of her tormentor. Not once did she break eye contact as she reached to her right and pulled over a Fenrir tome. Without hesitation she opened the book and prepared an attack. “Fuck you.”
Nowi waved excitedly. “Same outfit!!” she called.
Gaius turned toward her. “Same outfit!!” he replied.
“Now what is this?”
Gaius whipped around and put on a winning smile as he faced Gregor. “Heya, Pops. Whaddya think?”
The mercenary beamed the way he did at most things, the best noiseless approximation of his hearty laugh. “You are dressing like burlesque dancer today?” Now he actually chuckled, a burst of pointed noises that could almost be mistaken for coughing at the right volume. “Is not bad!”
“Yeah?” Gaius popped one knee in what had become his favorite pose he’d used all day. “You think I oughta make this my regular battle armor?”
Gregor couldn’t resist clapping a little bit during his next peal of laughter. “Of course! Safest way to fight! Distract them with your legs!” His cackling petered out. When he looked down to get the full picture, however, he frowned a bit and tilted his head. “Hm…”
“What?” asked Gaius. His weight shifted back to both legs as he faded awkwardly out of his pose.
“Don’t worry, not a huge problem. You are clipped in wrong. Gregor will fix it quick for you.” Without waiting for an invitation, the older man dropped to a crouch and began fiddling with one of the straps holding up Gaius’ stockings. “Loose garters kill better men than Gregor, you know.”
The thief could do nothing but squirm and glance from side to side, hoping that no unsuspecting soldier would walk in on this scene. Not that anything weird was happening, but there would be questions. People had been asking questions all day, and Gaius’ usual solution was to wink a few times and then run away. Not being able to bolt really limited his potential.
This is how it goes, he realized. You start calling someone Pops, then you start wearing your clothes wrong and they have to fix it for you in public.
“Alright, is done! Everything is good now.” Gregor chuckled as he rose back to full height, a sound nicely accompanied by the popping of joints, and slapped Gaius on the shoulder. “Good thing this problem is caught before others see you, yes?”
“… Uh, yeah. Yeah, it—yeah. Thanks, Pops.”
“Hey, Red,” Gaius asked, “when you found me in my tent earlier, you—you had to have noticed I was wearing this wrong, right?”
“I have no idea what you mean,” answered Anna in the tone of someone who has a very good idea what they mean. Then she walked away.
“I’m not sure I follow this new trend.”
“No trend yet, Whiskers. Betcha two figs it will be soon, though.”
“Why would I do that when I can find figs on my own?” Panne’s voice covered the same dark range it always did, and aside from slightly raised ears and eyebrows, her face was the same as well. He had hoped to throw her off a little bit, maybe provoke a blush if lucky, but somehow she seemed less affected by this than most of his favorite forms of bad behavior. “Or is that another convention of human society I have yet to grasp?”
Gaius searched the horizon as if a more collected version of his internal dialogue were written in the clouds. Eventually his main thoughts clicked into place. “Uh, you mean the outfit, or the betting part?”
“The betting.”
“Uh… Well, no, I don’t think we covered gambling in any detail.”
“Just as well, then.”
A placid silence settled on the two Shepherds as Gaius weighed his values. It would look really desperate if he had to ask her directly what she thought of the lingerie, since he had failed to lead her into it—no, you know what, he’d just ask anyway. “So, uh. You really don’t…? Is this not doing anything for you?”
Panne blinked, looking up and down as if to scoop up some free-drifting opinion that she could use. “Your clothes? No, not especially.” Sensing his disappointment, she hastily went on, “But I suppose that, erm… it must do something for somebody.”
“You don’t have to say that, Whiskers.”
“Someone here, perhaps. Might think you look alright. In that.”
“You really don’t have to say that, Whiskers.”
Inspired by some flicker of mischief, Panne’s blank mouth broadened into the unsettling grin of a hunter taking aim at their mark. “At any rate, since it’s only clothing, if you were to give up, you could at least get out of it on your own. At least you aren’t stuck on a cliff.”
“That was one time!”
“It was multiple times.”
Gaius waved flirtatiously. “Same outfit!!” he called.
Olivia coughed up an unintelligible half-formed reply and scurried away, her face already glowing a vivid red.
A bead of sweat fell to the ground, a syncopated accent to the rhythmic clatter of wooden blade against dummy. The pride of Regna Ferox’s West Khan paid no attention to it, his mind focused acutely on the target before him. Nothing must break his concentration in battle—no reason to let a simple water droplet betray that. Alone save for a decrepit mannequin, Lon’qu slipped into a trancelike state. He was in his zone. His wheelhouse. His groove. He was omniscient in his personal world of arenas and warzones. And perhaps most importantly, he didn’t have to deal with his bunkmate.
“Crivens, you been whacking that thing all day, Bugsy?”
What a predictable twist of fate, Lon’qu thought before turning around and encountering an image he didn’t expect. Gaius’ lace-clad frame completely tore him from his mental rhythm. The interruption alone was rude, but ruining his focus was on its own level. Whipping around in a show of disdain, the swordsman rubbed his face and discovered that he was sweatier than he’d thought. “I’m not going to dignify that with an answer.”
“Aw, loosen up.” Like an unwanted audience member blocking the view at the theater, Gaius circled around and strolled back into Lon’qu’s field of vision. “How are we supposed to understand each other if you won’t talk to me?”
“If you’re playing therapist now, it’s hardly working,” Lon’qu grunted as he attempted to drag the dummy away and move somewhere quieter. “Most of them work fully clothed.”
“Really? Mine didn’t.”
“… I wouldn’t be surprised.”
The thief jumped in front of him again, cutting off the escape route. “Seriously, Bugsy. We’re supposed to be comrades, aren’t we? What’s up?”
Lon’qu accepted the futility of his plan to flee, dropping the dummy with a frustrated growl. “Bothering me is a personal joy for you, I know, but must you really choose to wear that?”
“Wha—” Gaius shook his head with fake disgust. “We bunk together for two months, and now you don’t wanna see me in sexy smallclothes? You disgust me. I thought we had something!”
“Oh, for—” Throwing his hands in the air, the Feroxi champion bit his lip and forced himself to cool down. “If you must really hear the truth, it…” Cooling turned out to be impossible—Gaius’ curious gaze was scorching his already-strained body, and blood was rising to his face. “That outfit is… not the worst I have seen you wear.”
Regret eclipsed all other emotions before he had finished the last word; by the time Lon’qu looked up, he could see Gaius’ ego swell unmanageably like an obnoxious, snickering hot air balloon. “Say no more! Few can resist the charms of ol’ Gaius the Nimble. ‘S only reasonable you can’t help feeling flustered.”
“N-no, that’s—you—” Gods, why did this have to be so difficult? Why the stuttering? Why the blush? Was his tongue even trying to form words?
“No need to be shy! You’re not the first handsome suitor to ask for my hand.”
“That is hardly my intention!”
“I can tell, Bugsy,” simpered Gaius as he drew in closer. “It’s all over your face. In fact…”
Lon’qu froze in anticipation of disaster. “What?”
“… the look of lon’qing in your eyes in clear enough.”
Later, Lon’qu would note that his fight-or-flight reaction proceeded faster than usual.
A sigh rose from the exalt seated on the other side of the table, muffled slightly by his steepled fingers. While his trusted vassal standing in the corner made no sound, he seemed to echo the sentiment. Chrom’s weary shoulders, having borne so much hardship, had spent their stamina and patience, and now he leaned on his elbows to stay sitting up. Eventually he opened his eyes to observe the man sitting across from him. “Do you understand why you’re here right now?”
Gaius looked away and pulled the bloody tissue paper out of his freshly busted nose. After seven seconds of silence and blinking, his eyes flitted back to his commander. Casually, he offered, “Because I’m flawless?”
“No, Gaius.” Visibly holding back, Chrom shook his head slightly, his true thoughts expressed more clearly by Frederick’s loudening breath. (Gaius could practically see his nostrils flaring even without looking.) “You’re here for indecent exposure, which, I’m going to be honest, is probably the last thing I thought I would need to deal with when I became commander.”
The thief rolled his eyes dismissively, but his smirk stayed put. “Seems unfair to me, Blue. Nothing wrong with taking a stroll on a nice day, letting the crowd take in the sights. Make a few people question their sexuality, you know.”
“Yes, that’s…” The exalt fell back in his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose. More quietly, he continued, “Maribelle told me she’s decided that she’s a lesbian because of… you. This.”
Momentarily puzzled, Gaius set down his tissue on the table, eyes narrowed in legitimate skepticism. “… Like, as opposed to…?”
“As opposed to being bisexual.”
“Oh, okay!” With the mystery solved, Gaius chuckled openly and retired his frown. “For a second it sounded like you meant she used to be straight. Was gonna say, did the part where she was canoodling with your sister not tip you off, or—”
“Okay, look,” Chrom interjected with a light tap on the table, “the point is, you… in her words, ‘ruined the masculine form’ for her, and I know she tends to exaggerate when she’s angry, but you still made her uncomfortable, and it’s because you were disobeying the rules we already set out.”
“Eh. I’ve gotten worse reviews.” His shrug was not well-received, so he looked for a legitimate defense. “Besides that, I don’t remember any rule about not being seen in my skivvies. You sure you actually gave me that speech? I didn’t exactly go through the enlistment procedure, y’know.”
Frederick’s sharp voice cut in from behind. “Be that as it may, it should be common sense that one should be at least half-clothed when walking in public. Your forgetfulness does not excuse you, despite our past lenience with suspiciously specific memory loss.”
Chrom leaned forward and inhaled as if to object to this personal attack, but thought better of it and turned back to the thief instead, both palms on the table like he might spring to his feet. “Gaius, this does not have to be so difficult. It’s a minor offense and it’s not worth this much resistance.”
“Alright, fine,” Gaius groaned, “maybe I misbehaved. I’ll take my lumps.”
“Good. Frederick will explain your punishment.” Chrom’s face cleared, and he folded his arms as he leaned back in relief. “It’s almost dinnertime. When you’re finished, find Frederick and he’ll explain your reparations.”
Gaius nodded, wiped his nose, rose to leave, smiled at Frederick, and began to leave. When he got to the doorway, he stopped and looked back over his shoulder. “Hey… thanks for setting me straight, Blue.”
Chrom smiled at him. “You’re welcome. I’m glad you’re ready to improve yourself.”
Gaius nodded happily and walked out. Moving across camp, he had a mixture of conflicting thoughts swirling in his head, but he knew one thing for sure.
He may have to wait longer to get his candy, but today was totally worth it.