Work Text:
It was on slow Saturday mornings that Arackniss found himself with nothing to do. He usually spent these days engaging in his favorite hobbies, the best of which was watching Pentious. Arackniss was sitting on top of a tall shelf of tools, watching the mad inventor work with avid fascination.
He usually didn’t tell Pentious he was watching him, currently he was holding a book up in front of his face to obscure the fact that he was watching the snake incredibly closely.
Everything about Pentious moved in fluid, precise motions, absolutely mesmerizing to watch as he worked.
Arackniss had spent hours simply watching him work, knew all his tells. When he was angry his movements got faster, bigger, voice pitching to incredible heights. When things went well he was all grins, tail coiled tightly as if he were a spring ready to bounce forth. All of this information was delicately filed away in Arackniss’ mind, right next to his few precious memories.
Arackniss told himself this was just his observant nature that made him want to know everything about Pentious, but that was a bold faced lie.
He was currently instructing the Egg Bois in assembling the latest version of an airship or another, and Arackniss marveled at how he moved so damn quickly for being such a big snake.
Pentious did everything with a presence Arackniss could never hope to possess, taking up room and commanding everyone pay attention to him.
“Niss, do be careful you don’t fall!” Pentious called up to him, jerking Arackniss out of his thoughts.
“Wha- oh, thanks,” Arackniss realized he was leaning far forward, in danger of falling off his perch.
“Of course!” Pentious turned back to his work.
Even though Arackniss had eight eyes, Pentious still well outpaced him. Each of the ones on his tail and chest saw everything from a unique angle, and the hundreds scattered about his various territories meant that the snake had eyes on everything, if he so chose to look.
Arackniss figured the only demons who outmatched Pentious’ surveillance were overlords like Vox.
It felt like Pentious always had at least a few eyes looking at Arackniss, and for once he didn’t mind.
The spider settled back with his book closed in his lap as Pentious pursued his latest technological adventure.
He had lately gotten obsessed with ‘Social media’ as he saw everyone else start to hop onto voxtagram, voxtube, and the other Vox-platforms.
While Arackniss didn’t see the appeal of putting pictures of his life on the internet for all to see, even he had kept up with the times and owned a hellphone.
Pentious on the other hand had wanted to get a hold on social media as soon as he had seen overlords using it to do seemingly mundane everyday dealings.
Never one to just follow a trend Pentious had taken to recording himself making dramatic speeches about how he would use such and such new invention to decimate Hell and take more territory.
He had a camera set up in his most spacious workshop, and Arackniss had helped him make sure the lights weren’t at blinding levels to allow him to record. Arackniss watched as he pulled off the apron he wore in the workshop, replacing it with his signature suit and tophat.
Pentious had a… persona about him when he did ‘work things’. He was somehow even more flamboyant than he already was, even bigger motions, his hood almost always at full extension.
And that damn smile.
His teeth were sharp as knives, fangs extending well past his lips. Arackniss could watch him smile all day, grinning like he could snap Arackniss’ arm in half clean through the bone. He could crawl into that handsome smile and die happy-
Wait, what?
Arackniss pulled himself out of his own weirdly morbid thoughts with a puzzled expression. He had never thought things like that.
“Love does fuckin’ weird things to ya’” Arackniss mumbled to himself, trying to ignore the heat rising in his cheeks.
Pentious went on and on about how this was the greatest of all his airships, how the firepower was unseen before all of Hell, and how it would make demons tremble before him.
Arackniss wasn't really paying attention to that, he was more paying attention to the way Pentious’ tongue moved past his pearly whites, flicking about in the air to punctuate his words with a sharp hiss.
The spider was… intimately acquainted with the way that Pentious could use his tongue, but it still never failed to entrance him. Pentious’ eyes were closed, so he didn’t notice right away that Arackniss had gotten down from his perch to come and watch closer.
It wasn’t until the camera had stopped rolling that Arackniss felt it safe to approach, all eight of his eyes trained on Pentious.
“Oh, my sweet Niss, I think that was a performance for the ages?” with every long ‘s’ nose, Pentious’ tongue flicked out.
Arackniss couldn’t take it anymore.
He actually pulled out his bottommost set of arms to grab Pentious by the lapels with all six of his hands, dragging the snake down to his height so he could kiss him as deeply as he wanted to.
Pentious flailed for just a moment, hood flaring to full length as all his eyes opened wide as he tried to process the tongue pushing its way into his mouth.
It didn’t take him long to process, hoisting Arackniss up so the spider’s legs were around his torso and he was supporting his back.
“Why, Niss!” Pentious grinned as he broke the kiss, flush in his cheeks turning his blackened skin even blacker, “Not that I’m complaining, but what possessed you so?”
Arackniss didn’t think he’d get to this point, “I-uh-I just…” he trailed off. Real smooth there, Arackniss. Real smooth.
“You look good when you’re monologuing like that,” Arackniss mumbled.
Pentious grinned even wider at that, “Let’s take this elsewhere, shall we?”
Arackniss nodded enthusiastically as Pentious carried him to the bedroom.