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It had been two weeks since Blitzø watched Stolas being orally assaulted by that (absolutely fucking jacked) incubus. Two weeks of telling himself he was happy for the stupid slut owl. Two weeks of telling everyone else he was fucking fine because everyone had to keep fucking asking. Two weeks of him collecting any stray feathers he could find in his car or on his clothes or in his office and putting them in a little jar… for science and research purposes, obviously.
Two fucking weeks too fucking long.
He missed stupid fucking Stolas, unfortunately, and as he replayed the events of the party and the morning before the party and the night before the morning before the night of the party he realized he might actually be in love with stupid fucking Stolas. Unfortunately.
Obviously, stupid fucking Stolas wasn’t in love with him, because why would he be? Especially after he opened his big stupid mouth and said a bunch of shit he didn’t really mean… well, not completely. But Blitzø didn’t even give a fuck anymore because of how bad he wanted to motorboat the owl’s stupid chest feathers.
So he needed to make stupid fucking Stolas love him, somehow.
“Can’t you just call him, sir?” Moxxie asked flatly, clearly annoyed he was being asked for his advice on the same topic for the umpteenth time.
“Christ on a fucking stick Moxx, I’ve told you a million times, NO!” Blitzø jabbed a clawed finger into his chest. Moxxie just rolled his eyes at him, leaning on the rifle he’d just used to take out their target.
“Yes, Blitzø, you keep saying that, but is there actually any real reason you can’t just fucking call him?”
Blitzø’s lower eyelid twitched, rage boiling inside his gut. God damnit, Moxxie was fucking slow.
“B, you know we are rootin’ fer you and the prince, and we wanna help but… seriously, I think you just gotta talk to him,” Millie supplied with a smile and a shrug.
Blitzø exhaled sharply through his nostrils, strumming his claws against the tree he was leaning on. “Any other bright fucking ideas , team?”
Everyone turned towards Loona, the only I.M.P. employee not to offer her advice this time around. Her ears pricked and then flattened, eyes narrowing into a glare directed at her father.
“How about you let all of us go home and you take a fucking walk to calm your stupid ass down?” She pointed at a wooded trail near them. Blitzø’s anger deflated a bit at his daughter’s harsh tone. He didn’t let himself look at Moxxie’s smug face.
He rubbed the crystal on his wrist and a portal ripped open. Moxxie hopped through almost immediately, Millie gave a small wave, and Loona shot him a pointed glare before stepping through.
Blitzø let out a long, withering sigh. He stared at the path before him and considered if he should just portal himself to a bar instead so he could get shitfaced, but he didn’t want to disappoint his daughter. He shoved his hands in his pockets and set off on the path, muttering to himself bitterly, tail whipping back and forth.
After he had been walking for a while, he noticed how quiet it was here, save for the sound of wind rustling the leaves in the trees and the chirps of birds. It was never this quiet anywhere in Hell… he had to admit it was kind of nice. He stood still, staring up at the canopy of trees above him for a moment.
The longer he stood in silence, the more the chirps of birds began to fill that silence. Suddenly he started seeing little round birds flitting about in the trees above him. More and more seemed to be flocking together, hopping along branches and letting out loud chirps almost like they were arguing with each other. Blitzø would have called them cute, except it felt like the stupid little shits were mocking him.
“Those are black-capped chickadees.”
Blitzø’s head whipped around so quickly he already knew his neck would be hurting the rest of the day.
Standing next to him was a wrinkly old human with a button up shirt tucked into his khaki pants, a thick flannel jacket, and some weird harness looking thing that had binoculars attached to them.
Blitzø would have probably killed him under normal circumstances, but he was more interested in trying to figure out if the harness and binoculars was some kind of weird sex thing or what. The old man chuckled and gestured at him.
“You’re a little late for Halloween, buddy.”
It took Blitzø a moment to remember he wasn’t wearing a disguise. “Yeah well, you know, it’s just… my favorite time of year!” He cringed inwardly. It was most certainly NOT his favorite time of year, at least not after this year. “What are you supposed to be?” He pointed at the man’s harness and binoculars. The man blinked at him in confusion, lifting the binoculars and looking at them.
“Eh… I’m just birding today.” He lifted the binoculars to his eyes and used them to look up at the chickadees that were still twittering away in the trees above them. “Those ones are some of my favorite birds.” He smiled as he watched them, then a few moments later lowered the binoculars and turned to Blitzø. “You know they represent fearlessness and joy, and communication! They’re brave little birds.”
Blitzø nodded as if he gave a shit about these stupid ass birds. There was only one stupid ass bird he really gave a fuck about right now and he was not here.
“You know, they’re called chickadees because of the sound of their call. Do you hear it?” He held a hand to his ear and grinned when a very distinct sounding chicka-dee-dee-dee sounded from the trees above them. “It’s actually a warning call. Looks like they’re nervous about something.”
Man, this old fucker knew way too much about birds.
“They’re easy to attract to your home too. They like all kinds of seeds.”
What the fuck would you want to attract a fucking bird for? What kind of weirdo shit was this dude into?
…
Wait a fucking minute.
“How–uh… how do you learn so much about birds?” Blitzø asked quickly, turning his attention back to the man.
“Oh, well years and years of birding I guess. I’m not entirely sure where I’ve picked it all up.” He shrugged and Blitzø’s shoulders sagged with disappointment. The man put a hand to his chin thoughtfully then perked up. “Well, If you have a cell phone, you can download Merlin. It has all sorts of bird information, you can really learn a lot!”
“Merlin like… the wizard?” The old man nodded and Blitzø quickly pulled the app store up on his phone. He found the app and downloaded it, tail whipping back and forth anxiously. “So I can use this to like… find out what kind of shit birds like?”
The man nodded, glancing up at the trees once more. “You can find out anything you’d want to know about birds on there. Have a great day!” With that, the man was hobbling off, no doubt to go look at some more stupid ass birds that weren’t Stolas.
Blitzø shouted a ‘thanks’ after him and began scrolling on the bird app. There was tons of shit about birds on here, and he was sure some of it had to work on Stolas. Birds were all kind of the same, right?
—
Blitzø had done some more research on “birding”. Apparently it was a thing a lot of old humans did for fun which made Blitzø wonder how boring Earth must be for that to be considered an actual hobby. In any case, he had gotten some of the necessary equipment for the job – he got the weird harness thingy which was actually not for sex, he got some birding binoculars that he attached to the harness, and he got some weird bird call whistle thingy.
Then, it was time to research about birds on that wizard bird app. Blitzø knew Stolas was an owl, but it turned out there were lots of owls and he wasn’t sure which one was the closest to Stolas, if any. A lot of the shit he read that owls liked he couldn’t do discreetly, like preening his feathers or giving him a rat or… bowing to him?
Huh, the app said owls might bow to each other during courtship. Stolas bowed to Blitzø all the fucking time. Must be some other reason they do it that the app just didn’t mention.
After getting frustrated and running out of options for doing things that owls liked Blitzø just started clicking onto random birds that seemed cool. He happened upon one called a bowerbird that made nests full of fucking trash that apparently attracted other birds. Seemed weird, but doable.
So he got to work spying on Stolas with his sick ass binoculars and harness (maybe birding wasn’t SO bad), and when he was sure that the owl had gone to bed, he snuck into the palace garden and got to work. He dumped out a bag of sticks he had collected that morning and started strategically placing them to create a sort of arched shape. That part took the longest, and once Blitzø was satisfied with it he dumped out a bag of trash he had spent all afternoon collecting. Most of the trash were items that were bright blue in color (according to the app, the birds liked that color) and some of it was just really shiny.
He grinned at the trash nest he made. Stolas was going to love it.
He scurried back to his van and decided to sleep in the backseat, knowing he’d need to be up early to spy–I mean, go birding .
—
The next morning, Stolas woke up feeling like shit.
He felt like shit most mornings, but the last two weeks had been even worse. On the last full moon he had given Blitzø the crystal and it went horribly, though he wasn’t entirely surprised. Still, it didn’t hurt any less.
He hadn’t meant to make out with the random incubus at the party, and while it had been fun Stolas had regretted it tremendously. He’d been told Blitzø saw them and walked out, and he wasn’t shocked. He had been so upset with all of the things Blitzø had said to him both the night of the full moon and (in his drunken state) at the party… but the more time he had to think about it, he started to understand what the imp had been saying to him. And he had to go and make out with that random hot dude to really stick the knife in further, huh?
All he wanted to do was apologize and find a way to make it up to the imp, but he was fairly certain Blitzø was done with him. He hadn’t called or texted since the party and Verosika had told him that meant he had moved on, in her experience.
He pulled himself out of bed and slipped on his robe and slippers, rubbing his eyes with the backs of his hands. A walk in the garden might be just the thing to cheer him up, he decided.
When he stepped outside he was confronted with an odd sight. Someone had stacked a bunch of sticks up right in the middle of his plants and… dumped trash everywhere? Stolas stared at it with confusion, not sure if he should laugh or cry.
He glanced around dumbly, trying to make sense of the situation when he noticed a note that one of his plants was chewing on. He tried to get the entire thing out of the plant’s mouth, but he ended up tearing it in half and his plant swallowed the rest. All that was left of the note read ‘4 U -Blitzø’.
Stolas stared at the note, then back at the trash scattered all over his garden, then back at the note.
Tears stung at the corners of his eyes.
Why would Blitzø do something like this?
—
Blitzø stared through his binoculars, having woken up at the crack of dawn to watch for the owl. Finally, he saw Stolas heading into the garden and his tail flicked back and forth in anticipation.
Even with the binoculars it was kind of hard to see Stolas’ reaction, but he definitely looked impressed. Then, he saw the owl picking up the note and shit , it almost looked like he was crying. Happy tears, no doubt!
He grinned to himself and put the binoculars down. Any minute now, Stolas would probably text him, thanking him for the bower bullshit he made and asking him to come over.
Any minute.
Aaaany … minute….
When several minutes had passed, Blitzø looked through the binoculars again to see that the trash and the sticks had all been cleared away and Stolas was no longer outside. He scratched his head. Maybe Stolas had portaled it inside the palace somewhere so he could keep looking at it? Maybe he just needed to wait a little longer, and Stolas would message or call.
But after an hour and a half, Blitzø was realizing that for whatever reason the owl was not going to be reaching out to him.
Why were birds so fucking confusing? He did the bird thing, why hadn’t it worked?
Maybe he needed to do more bird things?
He opened the app on his phone and scrolled through the birds. He stopped when he saw a penguin, shivering as he remembered their recent mission with the bloodthirsty assholes. However, not all penguins were assholes, he was sure, and maybe they had some good ideas.
It turns out, some penguins will gift their chosen mate with a pretty stone to show their affection. That didn’t seem too hard to do!
He scuttled off in search of the perfect shiny rock to gift Stolas with, sure that this would be the thing he needed to get the bird’s attention.
—
It was around 2 pm and Stolas had finally decided he should eat something. He’d meant to have breakfast, but finding out Blitzø had trashed one of his favorite places had upset him so much he lost his appetite. He’d magicked all the trash away and it hadn’t really caused any harm, but it still bothered him.
He had been tempted to reach out to the imp but in the end decided it was best to leave it. Clearly, Blitzø wanted to punish him for how he had acted, and he felt like maybe he deserved it.
Sighing to himself, he lowered himself onto one of the lawn chairs by his pool, a bowl of flavorless cereal in his hands. He lazily spooned it into his beak.
After finishing his cereal, he set the bowl down and laid his head back and closed his eyes. Listening to the sound of the waterfall feature, the plants rustling, the very faint noises of the city, it was starting to make him forget all about–
THUNK
“FUCK!” Stolas gasped as something hard hit him in the side of his head and pain blossomed in his temple. He shot up and whipped his head back and forth, trying to find the source of the pain. A baseball sized rock was resting on the ground next to his chair and he carefully bent down to pick it up, wincing at the pain that was steadily getting worse.
“What in Satan’s name…” he muttered as he looked the rock over. Where had it come from?
He was pulled from his thoughts when he heard a rustling and his head twisted 180 degrees behind him, just catching sight of Blitzø scurrying over the palace wall. He’d almost gone after him, but found himself frozen to the spot.
Stolas just stood there, one hand rubbing his temple, the other holding the rock that the imp had (allegedly) thrown at his head. Yet again, tears welled up in his eyes.
Yet again, he wondered why Blitzø was doing this.
—
Blitzø gasped as he sprinted back to his van, throwing himself into the driver’s seat and accelerating away from the palace.
That was way too fucking close.
He hadn’t meant to hit Stolas in the head with the rock… he was more aiming for the ground next to the owl, but also he hadn’t wanted it to fall in the pool, and he may have over compensated a bit and he ended up decking the poor owl in the head.
But Stolas was fucking immortal, one rock to the brain couldn’t really hurt him, right?
Stolas hadn’t seemed too thrilled about the stone, but maybe once he’d gotten over the shock of being knocked in the head with it he would see how it was actually kind of cool because it was pretty circular and also kinda sparkly.
Yeah, he’d see that it was a nice rock and be happy that Blitzø knocked him in the skull with it! Any minute now he’d be reaching out to thank him, he was sure.
Aaany… minute… now…….
Fuck. After two hours of nothing, Blitzø was running out of ideas. It was getting later in the day and he was getting tired and hungry, but he didn’t want to give up just yet.
Maybe he should try the bird whistle thingy he’d bought. According to the bird app, most birds played special songs to each other to make each other horny or whatever.
This time, he scaled the palace walls and looked through the windows trying to find the owl. Stolas didn’t venture into many parts of the palace as far as Blitzø knew. He would either be in his bedroom, the kitchen, his library, or the living room. He checked the kitchen but saw no one. Next, the bedroom, but again it was empty. The library was his next stop, but it too, was empty. Finally, he peeked through the window to the living room and bingo! There was the owl, watching some sappy bullshit on TV looking like complete and utter shit.
Damn, what the fuck was wrong with Stolas? Blitzø had been working his ass off to do nice shit for him and he looked like he wanted to kill himself. Fucking ungrateful.
Shaking his head, he slowly cracked the window open. He wasn’t entirely sure how to use the bird whistle, so he just blew into it. A loud, high pitched TWEET rang out from it.
All four of Stolas’ eyes shot wide open and his feathers all fluffed up at once. The owl practically flew out of his seat and looked around in a panic. Blitzø ducked out of sight just in time and waited until it seemed like the owl had stopped pacing and breathing heavily. Slowly he poked his head back up and looked through the window.
Stolas must have settled himself back down and was again resting on the couch, though he seemed a little on edge. Blitzø decided to try again, but this time he wouldn’t blow so hard. Instead of the loud tweet, the whistle let out a low warbling sound that caused Stolas to have the same reaction as before.
Yet again, Blitzø ducked down and this time he chose to drop down a ways from the window and hide behind another window shutter. Good thing, too, because this time Stolas shoved open the window in a panic, head twisting every which way. Black swirls emanated from the owl and Blitzø recognized it as just a hint of his eldritch form.
So… maybe the bird whistle wasn’t exactly working. He decided not to try it a third time.
He waited until Stolas went back into the room and shut the window behind him to scurry back down the palace wall and head back home to plan his next move.
—
Today had been an absolutely horrible day.
First, Stolas woke up to his garden being trashed. Then, Blitzø threw a fucking rock at his head. And then, when he’d just been trying to relax and watch his favorite show, he’d been scared half to death by the sound of some bird that he could have sworn was in the room with him.
All he wanted to do now was sleep… after drinking some absinthe to help knock him out faster. Unfortunately, he was running low, so he only got a little buzzed before heading off to bed. He flopped into his bed lazily, not bothering to go under the covers or take his robe off.
He closed his eyes and felt himself drifting, breathing a sigh of relief now that he was finally–
CRASH
He shot up out of his bed and looked around wildly, this time ready to kill whoever the fuck wanted to keep bothering him. Just as he locked onto the culprit, eyes ready to turn them to stone, he heard a familiar groan coming from the imp who lay face down on the ground by the balcony doors.
“ Blitzø , what the fuck?” He spat, at his wits end. He stood up and stomped over to the imp, grabbing him by the back of the jacket and standing him upright. Blitzø yelped and wobbled, clearly dazed, then suddenly keeled over and vomited on the floor.
Stolas blinked at him, completely dumbfounded. Blitzø was standing there holding his hands out towards his fucking vomit looking proud.
“Tada!”
He glanced down and saw that Blitzø had thrown up… a fucking flower?
The tears from earlier welled up in the corner of his eyes and he felt all of the frustration of the day hitting him again at full force.
“Blitzø, what in Satan’s name is fucking wrong with you? Are you trying to make me fucking miserable? ”
Blitzø looked confused and dropped his arms to his side. The imp looked down at the vomit soaked flower and fucking picked it up , holding it out towards him.
“I read that birds like this kind of shit. You don’t like this?” He waved the flower towards him once, flinging little bits of his own puke everywhere.
Stolas lower eyelid twitched. He genuinely felt like he might be going crazy at this moment. He fucking laughed, hard . He couldn’t stop, and Blitzø was looking more and more confused. Suddenly he was gasping for breath from laughing so hard.
“Why the fuck – WHO the fuck would like this ?” He gestured at the flower, trying to control his laughter, and also the tears. The mix of emotions swirling around inside of him right now made him feel like he might be throwing up next.
Blitzø blinked up at him with concern for just a moment and then the next moment he was glaring at the owl. “This fucking… bird app said you’d like it!” He held up his phone which was opened to some app that had pictures of birds. “It says that lovebirds fucking throw up to impress each other!!”
This was a lot of information to take in and almost none of it made sense. Stolas chose to address the easiest topic first. “Blitzø, I’m an owl , not a lovebird, you idiot .”
Blitzø rolled his eyes, tail thrashing back and forth. “Oh for fuck’s sake Stolas, like it matters? You’re both birds!”
Stolas’ mouth twitched as he stood there, shaking. He couldn’t think of anything to say to the imp, truly. Luckily, Blitzø broke the silence so he didn’t have to.
“I’ve been trying all fucking day to make you happy and you’ve been a fucking dickhole about it, Stolas!” Blitzø scrolled through his phone and held up an image of another bird that was not an owl. “I made you a fucking bower or… whatever the fuck this shit is… in your garden! And–and…” he scrolled to show him a picture of a penguin. “And I got you a really cool rock because it said these birds do that shit for other birds they like. And–” he held up a tiny red whistle and blew into it, a loud TWEET sounding that once again scared Stolas half to death, his eyes again going wide and feathers fluffing out. The imp winced and looked apologetic, putting it away. “And… I got this… bird whistle thing… it said that birds like it…”
It seemed Blitzø was losing steam, and Stolas was so confused he wondered if maybe this was all a dream. He cleared his throat and tried to speak with a level voice. “Blitzø, when I woke up this morning, I felt like shit. The one thing I looked forward to was going into my garden and I come out to see you’ve fucking trashed it and left a note that said 4 U.” He folded his arms, staring down at the imp who blinked slowly.
“I–I wrote more on that note! It said ‘I’m sorry and I made this bower 4 U’. And I drew a picture of our horse OCs on the top.”
Stolas faltered. “Ehm.. well, my plant ate that part, I suppose.” Blitzø gaped, and Stolas continued. “Then you threw a fucking rock at my head and just.. ran off!”
“I… meant to throw it at your feet but I kinda… missed…” Blitzø stammered, staring at the floor.
“And then you scared the shit out of me when I was trying to watch my show,” he said flatly.
Blitzø winced. “It was just supposed to be bird sounds, I thought you’d–”
“I didn’t . I fucking hated it.”
The words were harsh, and he knew it was hurtful, but at this point he was so tired, so frustrated, and still slightly drunk, so he didn’t care.
Blitzø fidgeted awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck and staring at the floor.
Stolas sighed. “If you wanted to talk to me you could have just fucking called me.”
Blitzø winced, then nodded. “...Yeah…”
The two stood there in silence for a long while. Stolas felt his body swaying back and forth, the alcohol still making him feel hazy. Without speaking, he turned around and headed back over to his bed, flopping down on it again, but this time wiggling under the covers. He shut his eyes and pressed his face into his arms, too tired and irritated to say or do any more. Hopefully, Blitzø would just leave and not humiliate him any further.
Instead, a minute later, he felt the familiar weight of the imp crawling up onto the bed next to him and burrowing under the covers. Stolas was still angry and wanted to tell the imp to leave, but his body betrayed him, his hands reaching out and pulling the imp close to him. Blitzø’s tail wrapped around his waist and he felt him nuzzling into his chest.
“I’m sorry for throwing trash all over your garden and hitting you with a rock…” Blitzø said quietly, his clawed hands running up and down the owl’s sides. “And I’m sorry for scaring the shit out of you.”
“It’s okay, Blitzø,” Stolas said sleepily, rubbing his fingers in between the spines on the imp’s back. “I suppose it was sweet of you to… try…”
Blitzø rubbed his face against the feathers on Stolas’ chest for a few moments when he suddenly stopped and looked up. “The rock was kinda cool though, right?”
Stolas sighed deeply, pulling away from the imp so he could gaze down at him with tired eyes. Blitzø’s large eyes blinked back up at him. “Yes, darling, it was.” He reached over to the nightstand and pulled the drawer open, grabbing the stone out and holding it between them. “It’s very spherical, and it has an interesting sheen.”
Blitzø’s tail flicked back and forth as he, too, stared at the stone. “You.. kept it?”
Stolas nodded and yawned, placing it back in the drawer. “Yes, darling.”
Blitzø stared at him for a moment more before pressing up against him and kissing him. Stolas hooted in surprise and kissed him back.
—
The next morning, the two went for a walk in the woods where Blitzø had learned about birding from the old man.
“So this is where you got the wonderful idea to hit me with a rock, hmm?” Stolas giggled as they stopped in a clearing to sit on a fallen tree.
Blitzø rolled his eyes. “Christ on a stick, Stols, can you get over that yet? It was a fucking cool rock anyway, you should be thanking me.”
Stolas narrowed his eyes and lobbed a pinecone at the imp’s head. Blitzø’s tail whipped back and forth but he chose to ignore it.
The two sat in silence for a while, and as the time stretched on the familiar chirping of the chickadees started up all around them. Blitzø pointed up at the branches above them and the two watched the little black and white birds flitting about among them.
“Those are called chicken-dees or something,” Blitzø pointed out. “That’s what that old dude was looking at when he told me about birding.”
Stolas smiled up at the birds. “They’re cute, I suppose.” He slowly stretched a hand out, palm facing upward.
Blitzø nodded. “That guy said they are s’posed to make you feel happy and brave and help you communicate or some shit.” He watched Stolas as he sat there unmoving. “You can hear ‘em chirping, they say their name. The old guy said that means they’re warning each other about danger or some shit.” He snorted, poking Stolas in the side with a claw. “Guess they’re scared of you.”
One of the chickadees landed on the end of the tree they were sitting on. Both men went silent and watched it. Slowly, the bird hopped up closer and closer until it landed on Stolas’ outstretched hand. Blitzø stared at it with wide eyes and then looked at Stolas excitedly, grinning. The owl just smiled back at him with a light blush on his cheeks.
Then, in the blink of an eye, Stolas popped the little bird into his mouth and swallowed it whole.
Blitzø gaped at him in disbelief before folding his arms and turning away from him. “That’s fucking nasty, Stols.”
Stolas smirked at him. “I can regurgitate it into your mouth for you, since you said it was something that I should be flattered by,” His hands shot out and grabbed both sides of the imp’s cheeks and pulled him in. Blitzø flailed wildly.
“Stolas get the FUCK away from me! I’m not a fucking bird! ”
The owl cackled as he continued to pull the imp towards him, opening his mouth wide and instead biting him gently on the cheek. Blitzø yelped and bit down on the owl’s hand which only served to make him laugh harder.
Blitzø groaned and shoved Stolas off of him and the owl just as quickly pulled him back, wrapping his arms around him tightly. He got his laughter under control, mostly, still hooting occasionally. Despite wanting to pretend he was annoyed, Blitzø leaned into the touch and snuggled against the owl.
“I’ve missed you, Blitzø. And I’m sorry for… a lot of things.”
Blitzø nodded, not looking up at him. “Me too.”
Stolas sighed. “I suppose we should talk.”
Blitzø nodded again, this time looking up at the owl. “Yeah, but can we just do this for a little longer?”
Stolas nodded silently, pulling the imp in closer.
Soon they would talk and go over the painful things they had said and done to one another, but for now, they allowed themselves to enjoy each other’s embrace while they forgot about everything else.