Chapter Text
8 A.M.
The next morning was awful. When Fyodor awoke, he barely had the strength to get out of bed. After exercising, Fyodor always felt double the soreness of a normal person because of his anemia. He had been enjoying himself so much that he had forgotten not to go overboard. The couch did nothing to help this; the whole night felt like he was being stabbed.
Dre, on the other hand, woke up feeling as if he had slept on a cloud. Granted, he was still a little tired from the previous day, but the good news was that he didn’t have a single thing planned for today. The only thing he wanted to do was hang out with Fyodor. And maybe, try a new bar that was near their hotel. Of course, it was entirely up to Fyodor since Dre didn’t want to be the only one picking activities. Speaking of Fyodor, based on the smell, he appeared to have been cooking breakfast.
“Are you awake?” Fyodor asked, grabbing his clothes for the day.
“Yeah, morning,” Dre responded, sitting up and yawning.
“Good morning, I’ve made breakfast; it’s on the counter when you’re hungry.”
“Okay, thanks,” Dre noted, getting out of bed and heading to the kitchen for food. The breakfast was nothing special, just eggs, sausages, and arranged fruits. Five minutes later, Fyodor came out of the bathroom to join him while eating. They discussed the plans for the day and agreed to relax and stay within the hotel. Surprisingly, Fyodor said he would go to the bar with Dre as long as he got to pay.
“After all you’ve done, the least I can do is pay for drinks. Think of it as a small thank you for the trip.” Fyodor declared whilst cleaning their plates.
1 P.M.
For the past three hours, the hotel had been in complete silence besides the occasional rustling of pages. Dre was mindlessly scrolling on his phone, while Fyodor read the Bible he found in the dresser. Dre soon interrupted the peaceful silence, loudly sighing and slamming his phone on the table.
“What is it?” Fyodor questioned, setting the book done, turning his attention to the other.
“I’m bored,” Dre whined like a child. “Wanna play a game!” His attitude completely changed as he searched for a game. Much to his disappointment, the hotel did not have any games. Fyodor watched, partially concerned about the man’s mode switching like a light switch. After he failed to find a game, Dre suddenly sprinted to the room, leaving the even more confused Fyodor. A couple of loud noises later, Dre emerged with a colorful deck of cards.
“How about UNO?” Dre began to set up the game without waiting for an answer.
“What’s that?” Fyodor questioned, moving to kneel next to the table to get a closer look at the cards.
“Huh! You don’t know what UNO is?” Dre practically screamed, looking rather offended.
“No, I’ve never heard of or played it before.”
“Dude, you’ve been missing out. Don’t worry, I’ll teach you how to play.” Dre began by dealing 7 cards to both of them. “So, we each start with 7 cards, and you flip the first card off the top of the deck, creating the discard pile. When it’s your turn, you either place a card of the same number or color on top. Any card with a plus means you draw that number unless you have a plus card; in that case, you can stack until either one runs out of plus cards and has to draw the total. The cards with four colors are for you to pick which color the next card will be. The reverse card changes the direction of the play, but since there are only two people, it would go back to you. And the card with a circle and a line through it is a skip card. The whole point is to be first to get rid of your cards.”
“Oh, seems simple, you should start first.” Fyodor understood the game fairly quickly and was soon winning with only 4 cards left.
“You’ve got to be kidding me! Why can’t you spare me?” Dre complained as he had to add 4 more cards to his stack of 18. A little while back, he realized he had never told Fyodor that he had to call Uno once he reached one card. But not telling him gave Dre a glint of hope and a tiny chance of winning.
“Having some trouble over there?” Fyodor mocked him, setting his second-to-last card down.
“Oh, shut up, now draw two cards.” His smirk widened at Fyodor’s shocked face.
“Why? Is this a punishment for stating the obvious?”
“No, when you’re on your last card, you're supposed to say Uno, or else you have to draw two cards.
“Now, I don’t remember you saying that while explaining the rules.”
“Do you want proof?” Dre asked while pulling out his phone and looking up the rules.
“Hm, whatever you say.” Even with the extra two cards added, Fyodor easily won.
“Wow, you’re better than I thought. How about a rematch?” Dre asked, reshuffling the deck and resetting the game.
“Sure, maybe this time I’ll let you win,” Fyodor scoffed.
“Yeah, yeah, just play your cards.” In the end, Dre did win, and surprisingly enough, Fyodor didn’t purposely let him win.
“Good game. Since I played your game, you have to play mine.” Fyodor stood walking over to his suitcase, out of which he grabbed a chessboard. “Chess.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me, why must you choose the hardest games?” Dre knew little to nothing about chess; the one thing he knew was that the rules were extremely difficult to remember. “At least teach me before we play.”
“Alright, since you taught me UNO, I will. The pawns are the ones in the front; they can move forward once or twice, but only on their first move. They capture diagonally; once they reach the opposite side of the board, they can be promoted to any piece besides the king. The knight moves in an L shape and can jump over pieces. Bishops move diagonally. Rooks move horizontally or vertically. The queen moves horizontally, vertically, or diagonally like a combination of the rook and bishop. Lastly, the king moves one square in any direction. If checkmated and unable to be saved, the game ends. When the king has no legal moves left, the other person has won. A stalemate would be considered a tie; it’s when there are no legal moves, but the king is not in check.”
“Wow, now that you explain it, it doesn’t seem that hard.” Dre was, in fact, very wrong. Not even 3 minutes later, he had lost. He had completely disregarded the fact that Fyodor was very smart and strategic. “I lied, I never want to play this again.”
“Aw, you’re giving up so fast, such a shame,” Fyodor sighed, putting his hand on his forehead for dramatization.
“Yes, I’m giving up, you just beat me in three minutes, and you being the strategic one isn’t helping me,” Dre mumbled, wallowing in shame while Fyodor smiled triumphantly.
After 2 more rounds of losing, Dre finally gave up and suggested they eat lunch. It was Dre’s turn to cook, with the little ingredients they had, decided to make sandwiches. The two were eating their lunch, talking about random topics, when Fyodor’s phone rang. It was Nikolai, so being the smart person he is, he ignored it. He called again. Fyodor ignored. Again. Ignore. Again. Ignore. On the fifth call, he finally gave up and answered.
“What do you want, Nikolai?”
“Dos-kun! Did you like the surprise I left you?!” Nikolai screeched practically glowing through the phone.
“What surprise?” Fyodor questioned, slightly moving the phone away from his ear.
“Well, obviously the thing in your suitcase!” As Nikolai Fyodor walked over to his suitcase, he was used to Nikolai’s antics, but this was not what he expected. In the suitcase was Sigma’s head going through one of Nikolai’s portals. Sigma was blind folded with tape over his mouth, almost like he’d been kidnapped.
“Nikolai, you interrupted my break for this. Please return Sigma to the casino and don’t bother me again.” He just wanted to have a break from cleaning up the clown's messes.
“Damn you Nikolai take me back to the Sky Casino!” Sigma’s blindfold and tape had been removed, and he was now trying and failing to get out of the portal.
“Awwww but Dos-kun, that’s no fun.”
“Nikolai, if you don’t take Sigma back and give me a headache, I’m killing you when I return.”
“Fine!” Nikolai whined, finally hanging up, taking Sigma with him.
Finally done with Nikolai, Fyodor made his way back to the living room, muttering as he did so. “I hate that damn clown.”
“So what was the surprise?” Dre questioned when he returned.
“Nikolai put Sigma in my luggage. I need a drink. Do you still want to go to that bar?”
At the bar
When they got there, Dre and Fyodor found a booth in the corner of the bar. The bar held a cozy atmosphere with dim lighting, comfortable seating, and soft music in the background.
“This place is a lot less packed than I had expected,” Dre stated as he looked over the menu.
Fyodor hummed in agreement, setting his menu down, he looked at Dre with a look that only meant trouble. “How high is your alcohol tolerance?”
“What?” Dre responded, caught off guard by the sudden question.
“How high is your alcohol tolerance?” Fyodor asked again with the same smug look.
Dre knew he couldn’t handle very much alcohol, but his pride disagreed: “I’d say it’s pretty high.”
“Okay, then let's test that with a drinking contest.” Unlike Dre, Fyodor had a very high alcohol tolerance, growing used to it over his many years of life.
Shit. Dre knew he’d lose and probably never live it down, but summoning every ounce of courage he had, Dre agreed. Ten minutes later, about 20 shots arrived. 10 each, Dre could barely have 4; he was in for a painful night.
“Why do you look so scared? I thought you could handle this? You were so confident before what happened, Mr. Cocky.” Fyodor teased, having already downed 3 shots. “Lightweight.”
“I am not a lightweight!” Dre practically screamed, scowling as he took his first shot. It burned his throat as he swallowed. He forced a smile, not wanting to damage his ego further. When Dre caught up to Fyodor, they began alternating who drank, Fyodor still unaffected. After the fourth shot, the burning had partially subsided; however, the dizziness had begun. Slowly, the bar started spinning on top of his vision, blurring. Dre was not doing good at all.
Fyodor instantly noticed, “hey, are you okay?” he asked voice laced with concern.
“Yeah, I’m perfectly fine,” his words came out slurred together as he picked up another glass.
Immediately, Fyodor took the glass away. “You're not fine, you need to stop drinking.”
Dre tried again and again, his drink got taken this went on until all the glasses were on Fyodor’s side of the table. “Hey, I said I was fine, give me back my drinks.”
“No, we’re going home,” Fyodor pulled Dre up while he protested. Fyodor had to practically drag Dre back to the hotel, stuck listening to his complaints the whole way.
Once they got back, Dre slumped on the bed while Fyodor went to get him a glass of water. When he returned, Dre was already in bed without even changing. Fyodor sighed, ready to scold Dre when a firm grip landed on his arm, pulling him into the bed alongside Dre. “Hey, let me go,” but it was no use, Dre was fast asleep. Realising the other man was not letting go, Fyodor took off his shoes, slowly getting into the bed, trying to keep some distance. In the end, his efforts were for nothing as an arm wrapped around him, pulling him closer to Dre. Fyodor was extremely confused, not by the way Dre was acting, but it was normal for drunk people to do strange things. Instead, it was the feeling in his stomach almost like a flutter and the heat slowly going to his face.