A Quick Fag [open] [Warning: Sexual language]

Arthur knew smoking was bad for him. He wasn't blind and deaf, he had heard people tut and tell him that he was going to get lung cancer, and he should know what he was putting in to his lungs. He knew about tar, carbon monoxide and empysema, he'd done biology. But really, coulding a man kill himself quietly without people judging him?

Nicotine helped him relax and he needed to destress a lot these days. His back hurt a lot and the wings hurt even more, when they were out. He could still barely move them, but he refused to tell anyone about them, though he knew he wasn't an isolated case. He didn't want them to see him struggling, he didn't want help. All he wanted was a cigarette and a warm bath to help relax his muscles.

He didn't smoke in his flat, the smoke damaged the books and he didn't like smelling it when he got in from school. Normally, he went outside or to his balcony, but it was raining (something he loved under normal circumstances, especially with his strange new affinity for water) and rather windy, which didn't make good conditions for keeping a cigarette alight. So instead, he snuck out in to the stairwell, which was usually abandoned, as most people took the lift, especially this far up.

He wasn't very well dressed, at the moment. Wearing a pair of boxers and a large wollen jumper that he'd knitted himself, he'd been in bed most of the morning, as lazy as that sounded. He took a cigarette from the packet and stuck it in his mouth, letting it hang there lazily as he grabbed his lighter, cupping around it protectively as he lit the cigarette. Sweet sweet nicotine.

Alfred hated cigarettes. They stunk, they killed you, and from what he heard they tasted like shit. He couldn't understand why some of his peers, even here in England, liked smoking so much. Or why the hell it was considered cool and a necessary thing for popularity. Were people really that suicidal? He knew Lithuania was the first one on the list, but the UK was the 66th!

...Okay, that was scary. He really should stop reading Wikipedia. Back to the topic at hand, Alfred hated cigs. But if he had to smoke to stay popular, then he was sure as hell going to smoke. In public, at least. Speaking of smoke...

The disgusting smell in the air was undeniably from a cigarette. That was weird; no one ever smoked on the stairs this high up. Alfred would knew; he used them every day. He poked his head over the railing, wondering who would be smoking here.

It was a guy with short blond hair. And he was shorter than Alfred. Said taller male frowned. Why was a kid smoking here? "Hey, kiddo, what do ya think you're doing, smoking here?"

Arthur looked up at the sound of a rather chirpy voice, a sour look on his face. Kiddo? Who did he think he was? This guy was the one with the baby face, Arthur rather liked to think he looked old for his age. He'd been able to by beer since he was sixteen, without anyone questioning his age. "I thought, I 'want' a fag, and came out here," He said, taking a long drag and exhaling, watching the smoke spiral and dance up through the stare well, "Simple as."

He hadn't thought he'd meet anyone out here, it was the fucking stairwell! Nobody in their right minds used the stairs when they could go in the nice shiny lift. He figured he should be embarassed, to be seen in a jumper and a pair of fairy covered boxer shorts, but now this kid was here, all he felt was annoyed. He didn't need to lecture Arthur. "What do you think you're doing here?" He asked sarcastically.

He blinked. Whoa. That smoking guy was definitely not a kid, judging by his face. He looked much, much older than Alfred. Like, two-three years older at least. "Oops, sorry man, thought you were a kid for a moment." It wasn't Alfred's fault the guy looked so tiny from this angle.

He couldn't decide if he wanted to choke on his own spit or on the smoke the other blew upwards, so he did a little bit of both. "What" Cough. "did" Cough. "you" Cough. "just say?" He wanted a fag? And he came out?

After he finally calmed down from his coughing fit, he finally answered the blowing, no, no, no bowling, smoking guy's question. "Going down the stairs. Ya know, that's what people usually use them for." But really, why did this guy want to get a fag here? Alfred wasn't a judgmental person, but openly gay people made him feel a little uncomfortable, courtesy of his very much judgmental ex-classmates.

He hesitated for a brief moment. "Shouldn't you look for a fag in a gay bar or something? I dun think there are many fags around here." ...Or were there?

Arthur scowled, and was about to say 'what do you mean?' when it dawned on him. This obnoxious man was American judging by his accent. Hadn't the stupid man been here long enough to realise that fag actually meant cigarette in England. Or did he just forget and have a lot of meetings like this.

For a moment, Arthur was rather miffed and frankly indignant. He had nothing against gay people, if it worked for them then that was cool - in fact he'd had his doubts about his sexuality as well. But for this man to just assume that he was gay, and to accuse him of it, well, he wanted to argue. He was straight. Maybe, but the man didn't have to know that. But before he could get angry, Arthur's sarcasm habit kicked in. "Oh yes," He said, "We always meet here at 11 on a Tuesday. Cigarettes and blowjobs, I'm just waiting for them now." He said rather casually, waving his cigarette around as he gesticulated with his hand.

This guy had a very funny face, Alfred realized. One second he was scowling, and the next he looked like he was about to splutter. That might have been because of the smoke though. He wondered how the shorter blond hadn't choked on it already.

'All this coughing couldn't be good for my lungs' was a passing thought in Alfred's head as he had another choking fit. They did...dirty, gay sex things in the stairwell? That was kind of sick. Not that gay sex was dirty...wait, it kinda was. Wasn't gay sex done down...? Alfred shuddered. Eww, eww, mental images, eww. Really, he wasn't homophobe, but he didn't want to see two or more guys having a gay sex orgy! In the stairwell! He wondered if he looked as horrified as he felt. "H-here? You're going to have gay sex right here? Where people use the stairs every day?" This guy was crazy. Totally crazy. "Can't you just do it in your room?" He didn't want to walk down jizz covered stairs. Not now, not ever.

Arthur tried to keep a straight face at the guy's horror and shock. He was so gullible, it looked like he actually believed that the stair case around the fifth floor doubled as some kind of gay club. He needed to do this every week, he thought, get some friends in on it. But he knew that the charade would have to stop eventually. Now though? Why not try freaking out the guy even more?

The kid kept coughing on the cigarette smoke as well. He probably should feel a little bad for him, he was obviously reacting badly to it. Arthur had never seen such a reaction to second hand smoke that wasn't blown directly in to your face. Perhaps he was astmatic. Arthur did him a favour and moved him out of the line of the smoke a bit more.

"Well, not always full sex, you know." He said casually. He loved to act, and he was subtly trying to add more stereotypically gay nuances. He flicked his hair away from his eyes, the fringe was just long enough to oblige, and took another drag, having to hold the cigarette a bit higher up, since it was getting down so low now. "Sometimes it's anal, but other times it's just handjobs and blowjobs." He mimed for a few seconds a rather obcene act, just wanting to make him uncomfortable.

Arthur snorted, smoke coming out his nose. "Let them in to my house? Are you kidding me? But then they'd be able to get to my stuff. Besides, it's far easier to clean up the stairs. When we decide to clean up." He smirked.

He was tempted to sticks his fingers in his ears and start singing loudly in order to tune out the guy. Oh well. After the guy said 'anal', Alfred put his hand over his ear. "I can't hear you, I can't hear you!" But he could read lips. Damn. He didn't want to know all these things about sex! Gay sex.

He was truly horrified by the end of his next sentence. "Do you mean..." He pointed at the stairs, realization slowly dawning on his face. "You...here...not clean up..." His brain was very close to shutting down. "But I, everyday, here. Holy FUCK!" Th-that was...

"That's SICK! Dude, I don't care you're gay, that's your problem, but man, seriously! People use these stairs! No one wants to walk on your jizz! That's disgusting!" He was never using the stairs again. He would just jump out of the window or something. If he could angle his legs just so...no, no, bad thoughts, Alfred, bad thoughts. Don't break your leg because of this guy. "Why don't you guys fuck in a hotel room or something?!" He wanted to punch this guy. A bit.

Ludwig was still on edge from the discovery of his powers. The storms in London were apparently magic, and the crazy cult members in the country... Well, they weren't crazy anymore. In only a week of a new life in a new place Ludwig had managed to be hectic and nervous from a thousand different things. He was going to try to smoke less in England, but that was a promise that had to be broken; without a smoke every so often he was going to go nuts. He sighed and grabbed the matches from his balcony and went outside, frowning at the gloomy weather. Not wanting to bother any of the tenants with the smoke, he headed to the stairwell.

Though he would have expected it to be empty, but there was someone, and it was his neighbor, Kirkland; he remembered the name from the apartment buzzer list. Kirkland also had a cigarette, and was looking up at something...someone else. It wasn't anyone Ludwig recognized, and he wondered if they were in the midst of a conversation. (If they were, then it must be a strange one: Kirkland had a weird look on his face.) The other person was looking down at Kirkland, so he was probably interrupting whatever it was they were doing.

Not in the mood for a formal introduction, he gave a quick nod at the two, and leaned against the wall, trying to be inconspicuous. He struck a match, muttering something incoherent when it didn't light. Of course his matches were damp.

Arthur shrugged, "This is easier." He explained, "We're busy people, we don't have time to go gallavanting off to hotel rooms at all times of the day." He was rather enjoying himself, but of course, he was trying his utmost not to show that he was having fun. The boy was so gullible, you'd think, since he used the stairs every day, he would have noticed the come from when they didn't clean up, or at the very least, noticed all the gay men having sex.

He looked over when the door was opened, to a rather buff young blond man that Arthur vaguely recognised as his neighbor, who had moved in just two or so weeks prior. Arthur didn't really want to burn the bridge between him and his neighbors, especially one who lived so close, so he decided not to say anything else that was explicit, but he did allow himself to enjoy the fact that purely because he was there and looked as he did, the American kid would probably take it the wrong way.

He stubbed out his cigarette, which was nearly all burned through and got out another one, noticing how the tall guy was struggling with his matches. "Need a light?" Arthur asked his neighbor, stepping closer and holding his lighter up.

He shuddered. If he wasn't homophobe before, this guy was sure turning him into one. Were all gay people this obvious about their sexuality in Europe? Suddenly that 'Gay or European' song from the Legally Blond musical made sense now. N-not that he had ever watched the Legally Blond musical. Straight guys didn't watch things like this.

And when the guy mimed doing...Alfred shuddered again. He was, unfortunately, blessed with a very active imagination, so his mind had no problem conjuring up the image of the shorter blond doing that to another man. He really wasn't sure what to think, so he settled for disgust; that was the normal, healthy reaction right?

He was hesitant to walk down these stairs now. He didn't want to be anywhere near cum that wasn't his own. He shifted a few stairs down, leaning over the railing to see who the guy was talking to. He gulped when he saw it was another male. It wasn't Tuesday, but... He looked at the tall guy almost fearfully. "I-i-i-is he gay too? Don't blow him now! I'll run down the stairs real quick, promise, just don't blow him now! I don't wanna see!" He didn't even care anymore that he had to walk down cum stained stairs. He just wanted to escape before the smaller blondie went down on taller blondie and forget all about this encounter.

"Yes, please," Ludwig answered gratefully. He took the lighter, his finger slipping when he heard the tenant upstairs. The guy looked a bit pale in the face.

"What was that?" he asked. His forehead scrunched in confusion, looking over at Kirkland. "What is he talking about? I don't think you'd blow at me." Ludwig certainly hoped that it wasn't custom to blow cigarette smoke at one another. That, or perhaps it was some sort of English terming he didn't recognize.

He stepped toward the next flight of stairs upwards, leaning to see whoever was upstairs. He really wanted to avoid confrontation with someone he hadn't met before, but he did know what gay meant in English, and his face darkened. "Do we have a problem here?" he asked as calmly as he could. It came out instead as an unspoken threat.

Arthur stood a fraction too close to the other man. Oh, what was his name, Beilchmidt? It might have been that, it had certianly sounded German or something. "No problem," He said and stepped back again, taking his lighter back when the man had finished with it.

He nearly went pink at the way that Alfred had suddenly burst out with that. Couldn't he keep his bloody mouth shut or something? Luckily, the German seemed just as oblivious, or at least not knowledgeable enough about English slang to know what Alfred meant by 'blow'. He looked downright confused. Thankfully. Arthur didn't want to burn that bridge quite so quickly. "Uh, no, not smoke." Arthur murmured, embarassed. "It's a colloquialism, I'll explain it to you later."

And then the German stepped forward, a little menacing. Arthur bit his lip awkwardky, putting a hand out in front of him, to stop him, "Leave it. There's no problem" Then he looked at Alfred, "You, shut your trap!" He snapped.

Alfred was definitely not scared of ghosts and monsters, no way. But if he had to, like, really had to name something he was afraid of, it wouldn't be a tall, muscly guy that Alfred could easily take on. He didn't want to start a fight though over something that wasn't his fault.

He didn't realize the guy's tone was threatening, of course, but he did see the way his face darkened. He blinked. He thought Europeans were accepting of homosexuality. Shorter blondie clearly had no problem flaunting his sexuality.

"Problem? He-" Alfred pointed at the short blond, "-is having gay orgies in the stairs every Tuesday! Like, that's not normal! He should do that in his room or in a hotel, not here!" He shuddered at the mental image his brain oh so helpfully conjured up again. He was sure he would dream of gay orgies that night. Or tomorrow in class. Damn, that would be embarrassing as hell.

Ludwig's head kept snapping back between the two as they went back and forth.

At most times, Ludwig would be able to say he was proud of his intellect. But as the clarity and context slowly came to him in a dawning slap to the face, he had never felt so stupid for as long as he could member. Or embarrassed for that matter, and it wasn't even about him.

Speaking of...

He looked back at Kirkland. His own face was probably some shade of slate white, but he wondered what the man was thinking right now. What they both were thinking, and Ludwig turned back up to the louder blond. "So, he," and Ludwig jerked a thumb toward Kirkland, "has gay sexual parties on the stairs with several people, if I'm translating it correctly. You people call them orgies..."

"And you assume I'm gay because I came here, that makes some sort of sense. But," he turned back to Kirkland, "Your friend does have a point. There are diseases in here that you could easily avoid in your apartment." Not only that, but who has sex on a Tuesday, anyway? Ludwig supposed he had no right to ask, but it didn't seem ideal at all.

And he also didn't want to delve into details, but, "Why here, anyway?"

"I would hardly call him my friend. I don't know him." Arthur snorted, "He just poked his nose in my business like he had any right." Arthur looked down at the floor. Yes, he was probably right, having sex on these stairs would doubtlessly be very unhygenic, but then the whole proces was unhyegenic, from what he knew. He didn't really care, he wasn't actually doing it. "But it's a gay tradition." He argued, a little redundantly, "When it was illegal in the 60s in America, men used to have sex in and around trucks." He explained. He knew far too many useless facts.

Then he sighed, long and loudly and pinched the bridge of his nose. This was getting far out of hand, and he was a bit tired of it. However, he still wanted to keep the joke up with the American. He didn't neccesarily want his new neighbor to think strangely of him either though, so he had to play this well, or, alternatively, just complain. "Didn't you have somewhere to be?" He barked at Alfred, "Let me enjoy my cigarette in peace, you wanker." Really. that's all he'd wanted in the first place.

Psh, he totally had every right, the guy was making their, perhaps not perfectly but at least clean, stairwell stink of disgusting cigarettes. And it wasn't his fault the other blond looked short enough to be a kid from this angle! He should grown taller or something. Maybe he didn't eat his veggies as a kid. Not that Alfred did, and he still grew up. Heh, suck that, stupid veggies.

...Gay tradition? "Makes sense, I guess. Gay establishments were routinely raided by the police to arrest gay people. Like Stonewall Inn in NYC." Alfred gaped. What the...? What did he just say? More importantly, how did he know? He wasn't all that interested in gay right movements. Wow, was he random.

He blinked at Shortie. "...I don't wanna step on those stairs. And I can't jump down, you guys are in the way." He wasn't in a hurry, actually. He had nowhere to be. "And who knows, maybe I just wanna enjoy your delightful company." Yes, Alfred could be sarcastic too if he tried. It wasn't entirely a lie though; Shortie looked like a fun person to annoy, when he wasn't being all creepy and gay and orgy-loving.

Ludwig didn't look at the two as they bantered back and forth; he found a focal point and stared at it, intently trying to inhale his cigarette. Frankly, he didn't know much about gay history, and he certainly hoped they weren't expecting him to sputter something out about it. Even if the other one--Ludiwg mentally noted him as 'The American'--held his mouth agape afterward in shock. Perhaps he was a closet gay?

Ludwig shook his head. He shouldn't and didn't really care. "You wear shoes, don't you?" Ludwig asked the American, "Would it really matter?" To him, it was a disgusting practice for anyone to leave their sexual remains on the stairs, but he was getting closer to the end of his short fuse, and his cigarette wasn't helping at all.

And he wasn't sure what they thought he was--sexually. The very idea made a blush crawl up his cheeks and he snorted some grey smoke out of his nose. He wished he could just disappear or fade through the wall or something.

He breathed the smoke back in and his breath felt a bit lighter, as if his chest had been weighed down by some object and it was slowly lifting. "If 'delightful company' is what you're looking for," he began, "then perhaps I'm in the wrong spot." He noticed himself begin to lift a few inches.

In fact, he grew lighter, but he grew bigger.

~~~~

((This was the only way I could try to fit in powers for us all to begin... I feel I should make an amendment to my second power: As a drawback of his losing mass power, his volume expands, thus to remain the same density.))

Arthur nodded. “Exactly.” He smirked at how shocked that the guy looked that he’d remembered the fact about Stonewall. He’d probably heard about it in a school assembly or in a documentary. Arthur, of course, had read it in a book. He retained so much from the books he’d read, he could even speak Italian, Spanish, German and French. (he only had half an idea of what the words meant, but he could recite whole passages written in that language. His accent was, of course, atrotious.

“You’re such a child.” He sneered at Alfred. Humans were disgusted so easily, he’d had no problem walking down the theoretically dirty stairs nearly every day but now he believed that he was going to get come on the souls of his shoes, he couldn’t stand it. Nothing had even happened on the stairs. He was getting tired of this, and he was getting to the end of his second cigarette. He would become a chain smoker if this kept up. “Please, do jump.” He sneered, “You can get to the floor pretty quickly if you do.” He suggested sourly, implying that he should jump down to the bottom and preferably smash his head open so Arthur didn’t have to listen to him any more.

Beilschmidt had been rather quiet and they had been engrossed with their argument, and so Arthur had nearly forgotten he was there when he spoke. Then his eyes widened; the man was floating a few inches off the ground like some kind of grotesque balloon that had was being blown up. “God, man, get down from there!” He snapped, in too much of a bad mood to think rationally ‘oh my god what’s happening here?’. “What’s in that cigarette, helium?” Maybe he was becoming desensitsed. Or maybe, since it was after the incident and he’d already met afew people with... abnormalities, he was beginning to become more used to the idea.

He stubbed out his second cigarette and quickly lit a third, twitchy and in a poor mood.

This guy was turning out to be a fucking pain in the ass. Wait...ew, ew, no, that wasn't how he meant it! He shuddered. They had been talking about gayness for far too long. Alfred feared the mental images would forever stay in his head.

Alfred glared at Shortie, his temper starting to flair. "I'm not a child. And sure, why don't you just move your much abused ass out of the way so I can jump?!" That was a nasty remark. He could sense it, even through his anger and annoyance. Normally he wouldn't have said such a thing, but this guy was really pissing him off. Damn it, he wasn't a bully, he was a hero! And heroes didn't say things like that, not even to people who loved gay orgies. He sighed, trying to calm himself down. "Look, maybe I shouldn't have said that. I'm so-what the hell?!"

He stared wide-eyed at the third, quieter blond. Correction, he stared at his feet, hovering a few inches above the ground. Was that guy seriously floating? That was weird. Like, really weird. Super weird. Okay, he should stop now. "Dude, how the hell are you doing that?" Did he have some kind of strange power too? Like Alfred's strength? That would be...kind of cool, actually.

Ludwig looked down at the other two, and with a small POP! he was returned to the ground. His extended body formed back into him with another strange sound and he leaned against the wall in support. He felt dizzy as the world had snapped back into focus very quickly, and he had to blink a few times to gain his focus back.

"Sorry about that," Ludwig murmured. "That doesn't happen often, so I can't really 'do' that... must be a bad cigarette." He tossed the box off to the side, rubbing his aching temples. "I just moved here and I think the coudy weather did something to me. That storm the other day must have messed me up," he trailed off, the awkward feeling multiplying. Why was he explaining his situation to these two? It's not like they really cared.

"I heard about the rain here, but is it really like that often?" If this spell--dizzy and possibly literal--was cast by awful weather, then he might as well pack up his bags and head back to Germany, where the atmosphere wasn't so fickle.

"Have one of mine." Arthur held out his packet. It was one less that he would smoke; even he was getting worried about the rate with which he was going through this packet. "These aren't bad. I've already had three today so I've checked." He said, turning on the lighter for Ludwig.

Oh... the storm. He remembered that and shuddered, his hair standing on end at the mere thought of it. "I've lived in England all my life." He said, "Trust me, that storm was not ordinary. Not in any way. We don't get storms much, usually it's just drizzle and mist. Storms are rare, and storms like that... are unique." he'd never been in a storm that had given him wings before. He thought that probably, he would remember that.

He thought about the way he'd floated up, certianly, that was a strange thing to do. Strange things seemed to have been happening recently. He thought about his meeting with Yao the other day. Had they all been affected, like he'd seemed to say? If so... maybe he should bite the bullet and say something to the point, especially since the American seemed to take everything literally and not understand subtlety. "It's not every storm that gives people superpowers." Funnily enough, they were almost exactly the same words Yao had said to him and now, it sounded like he was the expert on the phenomenon.

He wrinkled his nose. Three already? And bad cigarette? Seriously, he was pretty sure smokes didn't cause someone to float in the air. That was scientifically impossible.

That storm. Even the mention of it was enough to make him shudder. That was the weirdest storm he had ever seen and he had seen quite a few. And the things that had been happening since then... "That storm wasn't ordinary by any county's standards, I think. There have been freak storms before, but..." He was reluctant to continue, not wanting to look crazy. He read up on strange storms on the Internet after that night, but he didn't find anything about weird after effects. Maybe people simply didn't want to talk about it? But this guy just floated mid-air, surely they wouldn't think he was crazy if he told them about his weird powers?

He suddenly saw a flash of a brown-haired, Asian-looking person but it disappeared as soon as it came. He blinked and rubbed his eyes. Was this that weird telepathy thingy he discovered in the gym with Berwald? "No...no it's not." He looked at Floaty Guy. "So, umm, do you do this floating thing often?" And then back at Shortie. "And what do you do?" Suddenly all of his previous anger was forgotten. If Shortie had these superpowers too, then they were comrades in a twisted way.

Ludwig shook his head. "Thank you, but I'll pass."

He leaned against the wall and listened to the two. A freak storm? Certainly it was, he was barely able to sleep through it. But superpowers? The idea itself sounded ridiculous... Says the one who was floating not too long ago. It explained so much, though, that the idea of having superpowers. First of all he was able to change his weight at will (or, subconscious (?) will). And, though Ludwig had accounted it to stress, he hadn't really slept in the past couple of days because he hadn't felt tired. He didn't look it, either. Perhaps the storm had gifted--cursed?--him with something else.

But no sane human would come up with the idea without a reason. "Something happened to you two, didn't it? The storm came and you've been seeing strange things or experiencing them. Tell me what you know."

And in that case, Ludwig wasn't asking.

Arthur closed his eyes, trying to gather his thoughts. He didn't know very much, but he could bluff his way through. "Well... from what I know, the storm gave us some kinds of superpowers. I don't know why, maybe something to do with activating genes? Mutations? I'm no scientist." He shrugged his shoulders, taking a drag of the cigarette, "It's happened before... apparently."

"Me, I um... well, I have wings. Like an angel." He said, "and I think I can control water. What about you two? I know you float." He waved his hand at Ludwig, "But what's your power, brat?" He looked up at Alfred, casually throwing in the insult.