Mad Dogs and Englishmen

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!It’s been a good evening.

Hermann is leaning against him, relaxed and loose limbed and smiling. Newt leans down and rests his nose into the crook of Hermann’s neck. He smells good. Not food-good, he can’t feed off werewolves, but just good, warm and comfortable and sweet.

Hermann whines, deep in his throat, leans heavily against Newt, Newt stumbles and is very glad he can shift Hermann’s weight and find his keys.

“You coming in, babe?” Hermann growls his agreement, smiling vaguely. He stumbles and has to brace himself against the wall.

“Dude,” Newt sighs, and leads Hermann into the living room. “I was really hoping to get laid tonight.”

Hermann flops across the sofa. “With who? He slurs, tries to scowl.

“With you, dipshit.” Newt lips his feet, sits down and sets them on his lap. He starts taking Hermann’s shoes off. “Fuck you and your- being able to get drunk self.”

Hermann waits until he’s gotten his shoes off, and turns around on the sofa so his head is on Newt’s lap. “We can have sex.” He nuzzles the front of Newt’s jeans.

Oh fuck yes. “You’re- really drunk,” He gasps, “That’s not a- good idea.”

“I think it’s an excellent idea.” Hermann noses at the button of his trousers. “Do I need to use my teeth?” He smiles at Newt, even with two weeks to the full moon, they are very sharp.

“Like that makes me want a blow-JOB!” Newt yelps the last as Hermann opens his trousers and takes him down in a long, delicious swallow.

Newt’s head drops back, groans. The fresh, hot blood bursts through him, he’s rock hard, Hermann’s mouth is hot and sweet and he hollows his cheeks, sucking.

“You’ve- done this before.” Newt gasps.

“Hmm,” and oh god Newt could just come now and he has to fight for control so it’s not over too fast.

“I- oh fuck-” And thought basically ends there and Hermann hums again, swallows, works his way down and werewolves must not have a gag reflext because oh god.

He sinks his fingers into Hermann’s hair, scratches across his scalp and yes yes yes. Hermann bobs up and down, tongue rasping over him, long and lingering, then down again, swallows, once, twice, and Newt comes hot and desperate and so very alive into his mouth.

Hermann gags, and sits up, hand coming up to cover his mouth and oh- oh right.

“Um.” Newt tries to pull his brain back together. “You didn’t- know that, about vampires?”

“So,” Hermann wipes his mouth again, “I did not just bite into an artery?”

“Nope,” Newt sits up, hands him tissues, “Totally normal. Not many bodily fluids beside blood. Sorry.”

Hermann wipes his mouth pulls a face. “Do you have any mouthwash?”

“In the bathroom,” Newt relaxes back on the sofa, “D’you want me to return the favour when you get back?”

Hermann pauses at the door, then smiles, “As long as you don’t have silver fillings.”

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Not sure which so going with dog!Hermann and cat!Newt

Ewt pads along beside Hrrm, looking around eagerly as they walk towards the park. The grass is so long he almost vanishes in it, and Hrrm stops for a moment, nosing around until Ewt pokes his head out of clump of clover and licks his nose with a tiny, rough tongue.

Hrrm sneezes, and Newt lifts his tail and prances away, batting at daisies and rolling in the dandelions. Hrrm huffs, silly cat.

Then Ewt stops, tail dropping to lash eagerly at the grass. Hrrm follows his wide, eager eyes, and spots the young rabbit on the edge of the grass.

Ewt looks at him, almost bouncing with excitement. Hrrm drops down, almost to his belly, and together they skulk forward. The rabbit is nibbling at the grass, Hrrm can smell it clearly, which means it cannot smell them. It has its head down, feeding, as long as they do not make a sound-

They are only a short bound away, the rabbit is still feeding. Ewt extends his claws, scratches the ground. Hrrm bunches the muscles on his haunches, tenses-

“Woof woof woof!”

Hrrm, Ewt, and the rabbit all freeze as Max bounds over to them eagerly. The rabbit sits up, and is gone in a flash of a white tail. Hrrm whirls to snarl at Max for ruining their little hunt- but Ewt yowls in frustration and dives in after the rabbit.

Hrrm forgets Max, he dives in after Ewt- he’s too small to take on even a small rabbit-

He almost runs into Ewt. The rabbit is gone, and Ewt is sitting very still. Hrrm manages to stop in times, looks down at his small friend. Ewt does not look at him, his eyes are fixed ahead.

On the pond.

Oh.

Hrrm sits, then flumps down on the ground. He leans down and licks Ewt. Ewt shivers, and turns to bury his nose in Hrrm’s fur. The smell of the foul, stagnant pond fills his nose and Hrrm huffs, trying to clear it.

He nudges Ewt, they shouldn’t stay here, he can smell the death here. Can taste it between his teeth. But Ewt doesn’t move, he’s starting to shiver.

Hrrm opens his mouth, and gently catches the nape of Ewt’s neck, he picks him up and Ewt mewls, shivering as Hrrm carries him back, out of this horrible place and back into the grass.

He lies down, puts Ewt on his paws and licks him. Ewt curls up into a tiny ball, whimpering softly to himself. Behind them, Hrrm hears Max bark and splash into the horrible pond. He growls, nudges Ewt. They are leaving now. They are now walking home with a dog that reeks of death.

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The rain is fading outside, which is a relief since Newt really hadn’t been looking forward to a flood. He blinks exhausted eyes, hands out the steaming plates of meat and fresh bread.

Mako looks dully down at her plates as though she wasn’t sure what to do with it. Raleigh nudges her gently, and she jerks, straightening suddenly.

Hermann hovers nervously, holding Stacker’s eating implements- the spoon and fork on a loop of leather to fit over his useless hands, but Stacker just smiles, and holds up his hands. “Thank you doctor, but I am quite alright.”

Hermann nods uncertainly and oh hell he looks awful. None of them are looking great but Newt just wants to grab Hermann and pull him to bed and sleep for about a month.

He settles with pushing him gently to his seat, and putting his plate in front of him. “Eat.”

Hermann blinks, “I must-”

“Just eat your fucking dinner-” Newt chokes off as a yawn catches him, wrenches his mouth open.

“We need-” Hermann jabs his fork into the meat. “I have to-”

“Thank you, Doctor Gottlieb.” Stacker says softly, he smiles. “Right now, we need you to eat and rest, and tomorrow we can start to heal.” He looks at Mako, who hangs her head, ashamed.

Newt winces, ducks over his own plate. Yeah. There’s like a dozen farms with dead crops because winter came six months early. There’s no way of making that sound good.

Mako raises her head, “I will.” She says firmly, a clear bell across the exhausted dining table. “I will repair this,” she looks down at her hands, flexes them, she sets her jaw. “I will.”

“We will.” Stacker responds, and puts a hand on hers. “All of us.”

Newt tries not so sigh. “Not too early in the morning, at least?”

Hermann scowls, kicks him under the table. “We will be ready whenever you need us, Si-” he chokes off as a massive yawn overtakes him. Newt smirks.

“We will not start before noon.” Stacker continues smoothly. “We will allow the sun time to warm the ground before we do anything.”

Newt tries to smirk at Hermann, but he looks so relieved himself that it falls a bit flat.

It has been a long, long week.

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The fish are browning nicely. Bastian is in his elements, feeding the fire twigs and bits of leaf with no one to tell him not to. Karla is watching the fish with hungry eyes and Dietrich is off somewhere, exploring.

Hermann is looking at Newt. The other boy is dressed in leaves and rabbitskins and bits of clothes that might have fitted him when he was five. “Does no one grow up here?”

“Hmm-? Oh.” Newt shakes himself. “Of course yes. Everyone does.” He smiles. “You go home, eventually. But then you’re grown up, and the other grown ups can’t hurt you.”

Hermann thinks of Lars, shudders. Newt looks at him, and Hermann can see the firelight reflecting in his eyes. He knows. Hermann sighs.

“Will you stay?” Newt perks up. “It’s much nicer here. The pirates moor here sometimes, but they’re okay. Just don’t bother their treasure and bring them coconuts. And parrots, they like parrots too.”

Hermann hesitates, pirates are hardly safe, even from a distance.

Then again, Lars was hardly safe, and they never had the opportunity to keep him at a distance. 

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He tries sometimes, even now.

He’s only got a single spinneret left, and all it can do is to spit out loose, shapeless mesh. But- he did this, every few months for twenty years. Every now and again, Hermann lies on his bed, very still, and dreams of who he had been.

Hands, face, hair and mouth and two arms and skin soft and yielding and no claws and Hermann closes his eyes and itches all over for the longing of it. To walk unnoticed through the world, to be harmless, without threat. To be human.

Hermann opens his eyes, smiles sadly and lifts his hands to see the three fingers, the tough, tiny scales, the long claws.

His hands are soft and round. Pink and five fingered, with tiny seashell nails.

He roars in a panic and slams up against the wall. He tips and falls hard on the ground and lands on six limbs. His bad leg buckles and his tails lash and- he is fine. Everything is fine. He looks down at his familiar, clawed hands and is desperately glad to see them.

He sits up, pulls the blankets around himself, and tries to catch his breath. Was this a- hallucination? Did he eat something bad yesterday? No, it was just a puffball, he’s had those a hundred times…

He looks down at his hands, resting on the furl of his limbs. He swallows, touches his face, it feels fine, normal. Head, crest, cheekbones, jaw. Him.

Then his hands again and- what was it he did? He looks down at them, then moves them together into a pair, tucking his thumb away behind his hand, until the fingers take the rough approximation of a human hand. He frowns, thinks of his hands. Those other hands. The hands he had seen every day for twenty years-

And the skin around his claws begins to pale. Hermann chokes, catches his breath, and it fades. He concentrates again and it- spreads. Down from his claws and over the backs of his hands and his spare thumb blending in and fading into the skin. 

The claws dwindling to the tiniest shadows of themselves. The skin peach and light brown and the tiny black hairs springing free from the skin and Hermann closes his eyes and lets it- wash over him. up his arms and shoulders and back and over him like a sheet drawn slowly to wind about him.

He doesn’t open his eyes. Reaches up sinks his fingers into that oh so familiar hair, the ragged top and raw undercut he loves but never felt he got quite right, the soft, broad mouth, the shallow eyes, the absurd nose. His eyes burn, tears springing free and oh oh that’s him. It’s him again. He opens his eyes and staggers to his feet, nearly falling in the tangle of blankets around his feet.

His hand slabs clumsily for the lightswitch in the bathroom, his legs tremble and he longs to fall on all sixes but he only has for and the thought is thrilling and terrifying at once and- and-

And then he’s there, in front of the mirror, staring into a face he had not seen for nearly two years. Had never thought to see again.

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The shower is an old one, the pipes clack and groan and the water bursts out in a torrent. Hermann closes his eyes and leans against the tiled wall to take the weight off his trembling leg.

Vascus muscles, bone marrow, nerve tissue-

Hermann closes his eyes and forces the memory away.

There’s a bottle of shampoo on the side of the bath, a razor and a bottle of shaving foam left damp beside it, he picks it up and it leaves a circle of rust on the bath. A little foam and the razor and the hard-won straggling beard is gone and danke gott, he loathes that thing. The water runs over the raw skin on his chin and neck, courses thick fingers through his lank hair.

He lays down the razor, picks up the shampoo, it smells fierce, a little spicy and he remembers the faint hint of it on the man who had brought him here.

Good. Let it be that. Let there be scent and it foams up between his hands and so unlike the coarse, crumbling soap at the Gathering Place. Let there be softness, and riches, and all the beauty he spent his life dreaming of.

“Um-” the voice breaks from outside the door. “I’ve got some clean towels. I- kinda didn’t do a laundry run. Sorry.”

Hermann nods, but the door doesn’t open. Hermann peers around the shower curtain, puzzled, then-

Oh. “You can come in.”

The door cracks open, Newton’s head appears around the corner. “Um, you okay?”

Hermann smiles, trying to fight down the sheer thrill that he was asked, he could have said no and Newt wouldn’t have come in. He has a shower curtain and might have a door in his bedroom and-

Newt puts down a pile of faintly pink towels on the chair. “Do you need anything else? I’ve got your clothes here.” He pats the pile on the chair.”

“Thank you, but no.” Hermann ducks back inside. “What will happen to my old clothes?”

“That’s up to you. I mean, I can try and clean them, but they’re kinda- um. I’ve got loads of spares you can have, but I’m gonna do a laundry run soonish and-”

He trails off, Hermann hesitates for a moment, a sudden, desperate hungry to keep the foul, rotting things. They were the first things he owned. The first things that were really his.

“Those clothes- you do not want them? I can have them?”

“Yeah, totally. All yours.”

Hermann exhales slowly. “Then yes, please get rid of them, they’re past saving.”

“Okay, no problem. I got dinner going so- if you’re hungry, they’s plenty.”

His stomach growls, knots, “Thank you.”

Newton leaves. Hermann rinses the shampoo off and the stench clinging to him with it, he smells of sharp spices and cider apples, his hair smooth and unknotted, his skin clean and smooth-

But for his leg, that is knotted, gnarled with uncaring surgery. Hermann closes his eyes, turns the water off, and steps out waveringly onto the bathmat and finds the towels. They are soft, fluffy, wrap around him like clouds and Hermann opens his eyes, then. His clothes are a little too large, but Newton’s included a belt, and it all fits.

Hermann runs his hands over himself, the clothes, clean and simple and- normal. Not his reeking rags, not the while robes of a donator. Just clothes. Hermann looks up, and meets his eyes in the mirror and- 

The illusion shatters. He knows that face. He hates that face. Some avoid their clones, never meet them even as they bleed them slowly of muscle, bone, organs. But Lars Gottlieb had not been one of them.

Hermann closes his eyes. No more. They promised they could change his face. Just a few weeks, and he would never see this face again.

He turns to the door, throws out a hand to find the handle- and hits something that bumps against the wall. He opens his eyes just as his hand closes around the smooth handle of the walking cane.

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The train is whispering through the snow when Hermann wakes from his doze. It’s rocking slightly, and when he opens his eyes, Newt has pulled one of curtains up and is peering out into the night.

Hermann sits up. Outside, it must be well below freezing, but their little car is well heated and he doesn’t even bother with a dressing gown, sliding his arms over Newt’s shoulders and resting his chin on the top of his head.

Newt mumbles something, but he doesn’t even try for annoyance. For many minutes, they don’t say anything, just looking out into the blazing, dancing lights of the aurora, the silent banks of snow and the little sleeping Swedish villages sweeping past.

The breathless magic of the moment is so perfect, Hermann doesn’t dare to move or speak. Newt’s body thrums under his hands with the rhythm of the train, Hermann can feel him swallow, move his jaw, trying to find something to say.

Hermann decides to beat him to it, in case he says something asinine and ruins the moment. “Thank you.”

“Um- okay.” Newt turns, the lights cast strange colours across the planes of his face. “What for?”

“Do you think I’d have made it here, like this, without you?”

Newt shrugs. “It was your idea. I wouldn’t have come up with it.”

There’s another long pause, the train hisses through a tunnel- the rattle and bang makes them jump- but it passes quickly, and the din stretches out into nothingness again, stifled by the snow and the lights and the cold.

“We’re-” Newt clears his throat, swallows again nervously. “We’re a pretty good team, yeah?”

“I’d like to think so.” Hermann rests his head on Newt’s shoulder and closes his eyes, savoring every sensation of this. The heat of Newt’s skin, the smell of him, warmth and slight sweat from earlier. The sway of their bunk and the blankets and the solid block of heat inside their car- so different from the void of cold outside.

“You have- amazing ideas.” Newt continues. Hermann smiles, the words sparking sweet inside him. “I’m not to dumb either, but you- you get so much stuff- better than I do-”

“Nonsense.” Hermann kisses his shoulder, licks a line over his collarbone- not in seduction or with any aim of anything further, just for the sake of it, for the sensation of smooth skin on his tongue and the faint heat of sweat. “It takes nothing but an effort to try and think about someone else- and you have been very good at that where I am concerned.”

“Thanks.” Newt’s voice is low, a bit husky. He trembles, but it’s not the train. “That’s- I really try.”

“I know you do.” Hermann smiles. “I might have come up with this idea but you- fleshed it out, made it happen. You thought of places I would like to see and I’ve enjoyed- well, most of them.”

Newt chuckles, “And- uh, if I couldn’t? If I was- poor again, and couldn’t do all this?”

Hermann pauses, half wondering if the sudden blast of cold within him could have come from outside. “Newton- is everything all right? Is there anything you need to tell me-”

“What- oh, no!” Newt smiles, “Nah, I’m not leading up to say I’m bankrupt or anything, just- if I was.”

Hermann nods, “Just as long as this is not some- desperate last splurge. Newton, I really don’t care but I hope you’d take better care of your finances whether you were a millionaire or poor as a church mouse.”

Newt turns, his eyes are crinkled in smiles, soft and sweet and- rather different. It cracks open a strange, liquid warmth inside Hermann, sweet and tender. “Would you want to be church mice with me, if I were.”

Hermann chuckles. “Little mice with a larder of nuts under a pew.” He kisses Newt. “I’d nest with you, you ridiculous little mouse.” Another kiss.

“For ever?” And there’s something under that, something wild and raw and wide open that takes Hermann’s breath away because this is real. This is not some silly late night rambling. The wrong word here could be disaster.

He seems to have done well thus far. “Of course.” He says softly. “Until we’re both old grey mice complaining about the new vicar and the sorry state of wafers nowadays.”

Newt half laughs, and it’s nearly lost as the train sweeps through a brief flash of steep banks, the noise rising, then fading as they move on through the plain. “Then- uh.” He fumbles under the blankets. “I’d really like to be an honest mouse- um, with you.”

He opens his hand. There’s a ring.

The breath is snatched away from Hermann as surely as if Newt had opened a window into the subfreezing night. The band is very simple, dark silver, no ornamentation because whatever Newt says he really does try and he knows Hermann doesn’t like ostentation. Hermann picks it up and the moment stretches on endlessly as the train, as the night, as the dancing aurora above them.

“It’s meteoric nickel.” Newt breaks it, half desperate, half helpless. “It came down in Antarctica and I had it shipped over and cast and I was kinda planning to give it to you when we got to Narvik because- top of the world, you know, but then we were here and it was so perfect and-”

“Shh.” Hermann covers his mouth. “It’s perfect, love. Its wonderful.”

Newt blinks, “Then, um-” he mumbles against Hermann’s hand, Hermann pulls it off, “Is that a yes?”

“Of course that’s a yes.” Hermann replaces the hand with his mouth. “Of course.” Against his lips.

Newt’s eyes close, the lashes flutter against Hermann’s nose as he pulls away. “Oh thank fuck.” The sudden obscenity makes Hermann laugh, “Because I kinda thought I’d fucked it up and this really wasn’t how I thought it was going to go- I got a whole speech worked out and I forgot all of it-”

Hermann kisses him again, firmly, shutting him up. “The best laid plans of mice and men.”

Newt hits him with a pillow.

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Newt wakes up alone. He sits up, the bedroom is empty.

“Shit.” He throws the blankets off, and kicks his legs out. The door is open and a thin, cold breeze cuts into the bedroom. “Shit!”

He shoves his legs into a pair of pants, and doesn’t bother with more. “Hermann!”

No answer. Newt runs out into the narrow corridor. No sign of him. “Shit. Ah fuck.” Newt picks a direction, starts running, his bare feet slamming wetly on the damp ground.

Boneyard is empty at this hour, the base silent and breathless and cold. Newt shoves his head into the tiny cubby where Hermann works- nothing, dark and empty, the computers dark. Even thought it’s barely the size of a closet, Newt looks under the table just in case.

“Shit shit shit-” Newt runs his fingers through his hair. Come on, where would he go? Did he have a freakout and go back to Miami base? Nah, he’d have woken Newt, but what if-

“Oh no.” Newt moans, and runs flat out. The steel floor jars his heels with every step. He braces his shoulder and hits the outer door head on. 

The door bursts open, Newt half falls, half jumps down the six steps down to the cave floor. The air is freezing and Newt rubs his arms as he runs, teeth chattering. His breath huffs up in steam and his bare skin seems to smoke as he runs.

Most of the lights are off for night time. The ground underfoot is fine and ashlike, Newt stumbles and struggles to keep up a good pace, wincing as his foot hits something sharp.

He races around the wreckage of the pits, the waist-high remains of the walls. “Hermann!” He roars, but his voice is drawn up into the unimaginable space above him, choked and silenced.

This is horrible, this is a nightmare. He’s even had it a few times and Newt looks around despite himself not really expecting to see the Masters, but-

Just making sure.

He tries to remember where it was. Hermann’s memories are cloudy and uncertain, but Newt’s bare feet mark out the same steps as he had done- so many times, over the ruins and shattered dead earth, stumbling over wreckage and-

He almost trips over Hermann, in the end.

Newt skids, stops too short and falls back onto his ass. “Hermann!” The sheer relief sweeps through him. “Fuck man, what are you doing-”

Hermann doesn’t respond, he’s huddled against the remains of the wall. His eyes are open, but glazed. He doesn’t even seem to see Newt.

“Babe?” Newt gets up on his knees, “Are you okay?”

He reaches out to touch Hermann’s shoulder- then Hermann looks at him.

His eyes are wide, the pupils tiny. Newt freezes, and slowly lowers his hand. “Hermann?” he says softly, “D’you know me?”

A blink. Newt reaches to him through the Hive, and Hermann’s mind is- slack. Sleeping, lost in a nightmare.

“Ah fuck.” Newt mumbles, and floods the Hive between them with warm and safe and love. Hermann blinks at him again, but his clenched hands slowly relax. He’s still asleep, but in whatever dream he’s lost in, he can see Newt isn’t gonna hurt him.

“Okay babe,” Newt tries to think, waking sleepwakers is supposed to be okay, but waking Hermann here would be- not good. “Come on, let’s get you out of here.”

The vague emotions through the dream feed through faint hope and disbelief. They’re leaving?

“Yep, going now.” Newt gently takes his upper arm, and helps Hermann up. He takes two steps, then collapses back down onto all sixes.

“Okay.” Newt says firmly, “Come on sweeties, this way.” He puts a hand on to Hermann’s shoulders, guiding him slowly out of the ancient cave, through the boneyard and eventually out- out into the eternal sun and blessed warmth of the Anteverse.

Hermann looks at him, mouth open wordlessly. Newt wonder what he’s seeing, in his dream.

“Come on,” Newt encourages, “Just a bit further.”

It takes the best of two hours to trek through the puffball jungle and make their way to Miami base. The moment Newt opens the door, some part of Hermann seems to realises where they are. He pads over to the bed and drops flat on it, falling back into real sleep.

Newt groans and slides down to sit beside him, exhaustion crashing in after this aborted night of broken sleep.

Fuck the marshal’s orders, they are never overnighting in Boneyard again.

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They fan out across the sky, close enough that their wings almost touch. Newt is a little higher, flying small circles around them and keeping his eyes on the ground. 

Stacker is riding Herc, lying flat down on his neck in full harness. He’s got a spyglass to one eyes, following the roads lining the swollen Totten river.

Hermann is leading them, his shoulder muscles are tight from this long flight, but he hasn’t said a word. Newt hesitates, wondering if he should suggest a break. By the Living and the Unborn, Hermann is beautiful. The armor hides the worst of the scars, and the way he flies- a long, rippling motion like sunlight on water, like a ray in the deep sea.

He looks up, meets Newt’s eyes, and gives a tired smile. Newt smiles back and-

“South-southwest!” Stacker shouts, “Five tails wide, south riverbank!”

Newt sees them. A huddle of Mountlings, two, maybe three Wisichers. They are on what’s left of a bridge, carried away by the floods. they are so far over that their tails are almost hanging into the waters.

Newt is about to dive, but Stacker holds up a hand. “Hold.” He’s scanning the area around with the spyglass. “They aren’t flying over,” He growls, “Why aren’t they-”

As if in answer, one of the Wisicher does exactly that. She spins around and launches herself off the bridge. Her wings flare in a dark, gleaming rainbow of colours, ripple and dance with every desperate beat-

The bolt hits her in mid flight.

A cry splits the air, and Newt only realises after a moment that it came from him. The bolt hits the dragon just under her wing joint, and seems to burst, a mesh of netting wrapping around and snaring the wing. She shrieks, and drops like a stone.

“Alexis- get her!” Stacker shouts, and Herc echoes it. The white furred Polora dives down to the river. “Everyone else-”

He breaks off, because Hermann had swept down into a dive.

“No!” Newt shouts, and drops after him. He can see the soldiers now, the sun glinting off the steel arms of their bolt thrower. He’d only ever heard of these things- had barely believed they existed-

Hermann doesn’t hesitate, he swings over the terrified dragons, and a gout of white flame bursts from his jaws.

The wet tree bursts into clouds of billowing grey smoke, blinding and choking. Newt lands with a bone-jarring bump, the mud sucking and splattering his armor. “Go!” He shouts to the frozen crowd- “Fly, quickly!”

“There are-” One of the Mountlings looks at him, her eyes rolling in panic. “We saw three, mounted- they’re here-”

“Go!” Herc lands hard beside him. Sasha is with Hermann, tearing out the hunting nest. Pieces of metal clatter, smoking, out of the hollow. One of the soldiers tries to climb out and Hermann spins, so fast Newt barely sees him move, and his tail catches the man on the back. He screams, spinning through the air to be sucked down into the dirty brown river. He doesn’t come up.

Horns blare. Hermann rears up, wings flaring, his eyes are wide, white and rolling. Flame is raging around his jaws red on the smoking black blood there. He shrieks, and spins around, stumbling down to the road.

“Prince, stop him!” Stacker shouts. Newt pounces and lands on his back. Hermann howls and his claws lash out- then stop.

Newt looks into his eyes. The fear, the terror. Was that the last thing he heard, before his family was murdered? Those same horns? “It’s okay.”

Another blare, shrill and brassy. Hermann shudders.

“We do this together.” Herc growls. He prowls forward, nudges Newt and Hermann gently behind him. “Sasha?”

“Thirty horse, some of those bolters.” She lands almost on top of Newt, her thick fur damp and spotted red with blood.

Stacker looks at the huddled mass of starving, exhausted dragons. “Go,” He says, more gently. “We’ll take them.”

This seems to work. Maybe it’s finally sank in that the rescue has arrived. They flail over the river in wild, desperate wingbeats, crashing into the far back and crawling away into the thick brush.

Alexis soars over them in return, a fine rain of filthy water dropping down. He’s more grey than white, shaking himself like a wet dog and spraying Herc, who hops and flares his wings in disgust. “She’s on the North bank, safe.”

Stacker nods, “We have a patrol coming.” He looks around, carefully. “Prince Newt, on the right. Charge their flank on my order. Alexis and Sasha- I’m sorry, but there’s a good muddy bank down there, hunker down and wait for them to come abreast. Herc and I will hit them face on and- Prince Hermann?”

Hermann trembles, his wings rise, tail lash.

“Stay at our side.” Herc says softly, “We need your fire.”

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Newt must have fallen asleep after all. He wakes up stiff and shivering, still under the table. He bites of a groan as he props himself up on stiff legs, blinks a few times to clear the sleep from his eyes.

Hermann isn’t there.

The destroyed tupperware boxes are still there, torn apart and starting to stink as the cloned remains rot. His bag trails away in a blur of blue and claw marks.

Newt’s eyes follow it, the track of blue stains to their battered sofa. There’s a new tear down one of the seat cushions, the stuffing puffing out, tipped with more blue.

Newt pulls himself carefully out from under the table. “Hermann?”

There’s a scratching sound from behind the sofa, a faint creak. Newt takes a breath. It’s not the Victor. The Victor wouldn’t be hiding.

Even so, he doesn’t walk around the sofa. He squats down on the seat cushions and carefully pokes his head above the back, haunches clenched to leap away if- if-

He can’t even think it. It’s beyond thought, an instinctive tremble in every nerve. The tension that had kept him alive, for so long.

It fades quickly though, when he sees Hermann.

He’s huddled up against the back of the sofa, spines poking little holes in the hessian sacking, the weight of him pressing a hollow between the wooden stats. His legs are pulled up to his chest, four arms crossed into a wall and head tucked down. He trembles again, squeezes his arms, his legs tighter, coiling up to make a tiny ball even tinier.

“Hermann.” Newt hesitates, doesn’t know what to say. He lopes down, falls heavily on all fours beside Hermann and slides his legs out to sit beside him. The tendrils on his back flare and instinctively reach for Hermann, but his flinches away, and Newt forces them flat.

“I’m sorry.” He tries. It seems a good bet.

“What in the world for?” Hermann’s voice is low, grinding and wretched.

“I should have told you.” Newt drops on his belly, puts his head on his forepaws. The heavy tendrils of his tail twine and flick. “If you knew, you wouldn’t have- freaked out.” It’s the best way he can put it.

“Freaked out.” Hermann repeats. His arms drop away and he looks up, his face is slack, jaws open in small, helpless pants. He’s so miserable and he’s the most beautiful thing Newt has seen and wow he feels bad about that but oh fuck it’s him it’s Hermann.

Hermann must have seen the relief on his face, he twists away. His hands come up, trembling in shame.

Newt slides closer, gently bats his hands away. “Hey, hey.”

“Don’t-” Hermann’s voice is frail.

“It’s okay-”

“I could have-” he chokes.

“You didn’t.” Newt takes a breath because it’s true. The Victor could have killed him. He would have been as easy a target as the cloned meat- and probably tastier. But it hadn’t. “Not a scratch, look-” He spins around on his rump.

Hermann looks at him, takes a deep breath, and lets it out with a heavy shudder. He rubs his face, his arms, the back of his neck. The spines stand up, Hermann wraps his arms around himself and this time his breath comes out raw, ragged- a cry.

“Hey- hey-” Newt forgets the Victor, the trembling terror-instinct of the last night, and pulls Hermann in. He feels frail in his arms, the terrible strength of his other self melted away and gone. Thin bone and spun muscle and Newt wonders how he could have even been scared of him, even for a moment.

Hermann doesn’t move for long moments, his sobs breaking great and fearful as though each one was rent from his body, his hands keep moving, mapping out around his body, reassuring himself that he is his, he belongs to himself and there is no one else in there.

“Shh.” Newt rocks him. He thinks, for a moment, of the great bodies of their larger cousins, how Newt could huddle against them and let the horrors of the Anteverse whirl around them like a storm against great rocks. He tries to be that, in the Hive if not in body, great and solid and unbeakable and warm and holding life and comfort in every crevice of his body.

Hermann must have felt it, and lets out a weak chuckle. He looks up, and this time, the worst of the pain has passed. “If it counts for anything, I don’t think I- it- would have hurt you. The hunger- nothing else mattered, but I- it was still there, under my skin, I wouldn’t have-” he touches Newt’s shoulder, very lightly. The tips of his claws- those deep blue, razor sharp claws- whisper so softly against his skin.

Newt looks into his eyes, and- he knows. he can feel him, Hermann and, deeper still, the Victor. There, in the Hive, curled up alone and afraid and- in it’s own way- ashamed.

“I know,” he says softly. “It’s okay.”

“I’m sorry,” Hermann whispers. “I ruined this. You worked on this for months and- and we should be so happy and- I ruined it.”

Newt shrugs, and hugs him again. “I’ll make more. We’re fine, Hermann.”