Fine Zinc Teeth

[ninefox]

There was a time Jedao would have said that half a century was barely any time; less than a mortal life, not more than two generations. But the world has changed so much since he first put the Americans' uniform on. Even the uniform has changed - they don't call dance halls dance halls any more, for another thing. But the smell of the place - sweat, desire, alcohol - that much is the same.

He slinks in under a stranger's face, although he doesn't disguise his own scent when he smiles, glittering, at the bouncer: a flashed lure that Fives might not even notice or recognize, let alone pursue. It took a few months to get someone to handle all the things which apparently needed handling for his "retirement", and a few more to track down one particular squad of decommissioned weretroops, out of thousands, mostly paperless, in the busiest city this side of the Pacific. But Jedao did find them.

He dances without keeping track of the time, lets his face slowly slide back to its default arrangement, lets his spine relearn how to hold him up without being army rigid. He has several drinks - people buy them for him, which is nice; one or two of them he even dances with until they can't keep up with him any more. Fives rotates from the receiving line onto the floor as the night wears on and patrons get drunker, and he maneuvers himself into Fives' line of view, always moving, twisting, flashing glances that catch on Fives' eyes as the beat hits. Slowly, as if by the whim of the music, he draws closer.

Comments

[callmefives]

"No, it absolutely wouldn't," he agrees, looking back at him again just in time to catch that flash of tongue. To have to catch his breath before he visibly gives himself away, though he imagines the stink of lust on him has to have been as obvious to the General as it has been to his packmates for years.

"Try telling that to Rex." He huffs in exasperated amusement. "I'm pretty sure he thinks we're all still in, it's just a much smaller military and he's in charge." Even Cody has loosened up more than Rex has, he thinks.

[ninefox]

Jedao laughs, bright and warm.

"Sometimes older brothers are just like that, I think. Even when they've never been soldiers."

[callmefives]

The laugh enchants him, so different from anything he'd ever witnessed during the intensity and chaos of the war. It's the General's words that truly catch his attention, though. The idea that the Fox General could have had something as normal and relatable as a brother. An older brother, just like him.

"You... have an older brother?" he asks, suddenly riveted, fascinated even more than by the General's sinuous movements on the dance floor or that flash of tongue. Enough that he even forgets the reflexive sir that a lifetime of conditioning had trained into him.

[ninefox]

"Had, once," Jedao says, but his tone is wistful rather than suddenly somber. "Smart as anything, but bookish and fussy. It felt like he was always yelling at me about something. Although to be fair, I was very good at trouble."

[callmefives]

Fives is more than accustomed to the loss of brothers, and how you remember their lives and move on. Mourning isn't a luxury the weretroops had been allowed.

"Sounds a lot like Rex." His smile is quick and bright and impish. "And me." And then he remembers himself and makes another scan of the room, by sight and scent and hearing.

[ninefox]

"How is Rex, these days?" Just because Jedao sought out Fives first doesn't mean he isn't invested in all of them. He's not sure when that happened, but it surely did.

[callmefives]

"Just as uptight as always," Fives answers, grinning. "He's good, though. Everyone's... everyone's pretty good. Rex was picking up shifts doing a lot of different things, moving and commercial security and shit, but he got a regular gig with a commercial security firm about a month ago."

His smile shifts to a smirk. "He tried working here for a bit, but he couldn't take the music and the drunks."

[ninefox]

"I'm glad." For all of them; he couldn't check up as much as he would have liked, in the circus of the stand-down.

"But you can handle us just fine, I'm sure," he murmurs, grinning right back.

[callmefives]

The fact the General thinks of them at all, that he bothered to seek him out, to attract his attention and speak with him, even to ask about his brother, is surprising and flattering in a way that has Fives on edge in the best possible way.

"I can." His smile widens, and he moves a little closer to Jedao as the crowd on the dance floor shifts nearer. "I like the music and the people and the energy. And I don't mind the excuse to throw people out on their asses a few times a week either."

[ninefox]

"I'm a little bit tempted to provoke someone just so I can watch," Jedao admits.

[callmefives]

Fives laughs, warm and low. "I can't possibly condone anyone doing anything that would be a disruption, or possibly involve violence," he answers, eyebrows creeping up as he smirks at him. "... but if anything does happen, I certainly hope I don't have to throw you out on your ass, General."

[ninefox]

"You'd have to catch me first," he points out. And wouldn't that be fun.

[callmefives]

"Are you questioning my professional competence?" he asks, drawing himself up in mock affront and smoothing his beard as he looks down on the General. "I'll have you know, no one's ever given me the slip since I started here. Or before here."

[ninefox]

"I'm very slippery," Jedao murmurs, mostly straight-faced.

[callmefives]

Fives catches his bottom lip between his teeth and looks down at the General from beneath lowered lashes. "Are you? At least you'd be a challenge, then," he answers, just as low, and in the kind of tone that always had Rex jabbing a thumb into the nearest gap in his body armor to try and get him to shut up. Because meat cans don't flirt with not just generals, but ancient and powerful beings.

[ninefox]

"I certainly wouldn't want to be too easy," Jedao lies like a rug.

[callmefives]

"I don't know, General, the more I think about it, the more you look like you'd be pretty easy to me." Fives absolutely knows Rex would progress from discreet jabbing to just flat out smacking him upside the head and possibly dragging him away while shouting apologies for his unacceptable behavior for this particular transgression, and finds he absolutely does not care as he grins. He's a civilian now, what's the worst that can happen?

[ninefox]

"Thought about it a lot, have you?" Jedao asks, voice warm with suppressed laughter.

[callmefives]

Okay, this... might be a bit far even for him, and Fives flushes, grateful that it's barely visible in the pulsing light from the dance floor. And yet- "I might have given it a little thought," he concedes, and for all the butterflies in his stomach and Rex's voice yelling imprecations in the back of his head, he manages a toothy wolf's grin.

[ninefox]

"Well, at least I know you hadn't forgotten me," Jedao faux-laments. He pushes himself of from the wall, his smile crooked, gentle and complicated, not sure if he should say any more just now after Fives' softpedaling.

[callmefives]

"Well, you are fairly memorable," he allows with a cockeyed smile in return. "You kept them from setting me and Jesse up in front of a second firing squad and saved Tup, after all." And Dogma, but he doesn't say that. Doesn't like thinking of Dogma if he can avoid it, isolating himself in wolf form and obsequiously trying to apologize for being the loudest voice yelling for their execution.

"You could come by. See everyone. Sometime. If you want." He doesn't make eye contact, looks studiously out at the dance floor, doing his job, and doesn't quite make it a question either. It's just a possibility, left out there for the General if he happens to be interested.

[ninefox]

"I'd like that," he says softly, softly enough that a human probably couldn't hear him over the music. Fives, of course, manages fine.

[callmefives]

His gaze flicks immediately back to the General, surprise and pleasure both obvious in the brief widening of his eyes and the quick tilt of his lips into a smile. "That... it'd be great." He casts his eyes down for a moment, and the flirtation is mostly gone when he looks back up. At least for now. "I think Echo and Tup would especially like that." Dogma too, of course, but he's still not mentioning him. "... I know I would," he adds, glancing away again because that's too open, not flirtatious in a way that can be easily shrugged off as teasing.

[ninefox]

"So where's by? Unless you'd prefer I just followed you home after shift."

Although that might be a bit heart attack inducing for some of the others.

[callmefives]

Oh, he'd definitely prefer that, just the idea has him almost vibrating with eagerness... that he quickly suppresses as he has much the same thought.

"Nice as that would be, I think Rex might have kittens if I brought you home at three in the morning." His smile is wide as he looks back again, and then it goes just a little impish. "But if you leave me your number I can text you the address when I get off shift, and... you could come by tomorrow night? Rex and Cody will probably want to feed you, and I think almost everyone will actually be home then, or at least likely to get home at a fairly reasonable hour."