Work Text:
“No.”
“Just try them.”
“Why in the Maker’s name would I do that? They’re so pumped full of preservatives that they’re the only thing older than the Elves at this point.”
“Exactly. So they’re perfectly fine to eat. Here, just try a bite.”
“Get that horrendous thing away from me!”
Once upon a time there had been a delicious snack cake brand. They were probably mostly plastic: that was actually a joke they used in advertising that they ‘stay fresh forever!’ only to find out that was going to be tested. The funny thing, which was funnier than the tongue-in-cheek joke about their ingredients, was that they actually did. Obviously they weren’t the most nutritiously sound things, but to find a box tucked in the back cupboard of a building or in a box somewhere usually yielded a pre-packaged treat.
Provided you liked them. There were distinctly Fereldan: vanilla “cake” with vanilla frosting, slightly too sweet and grainy, and what a lot of people called ‘boring. Cullen had read in some magazines that had been scattered in various homes over the years (when he’d been bored enough to read them) that people liked to fry them in hot oil, covered them in chocolate and eat them off sticks, and all kinds of insane things. Not having to hunt for food certainly gave people weird notions about it, apparently.
Cullen liked them, when he had the chance to find them. Dorian, however, had wrinkled his nose and leaned away like Cullen had just offered him something still raw and bloody. Apparently they didn’t have anything like that in the Ruined Imperium and the thought alone was enough to offend his sensibilities. So, of course, Cullen managed to offer Dorian some any time they came across them, much to his chagrin. Dorian had sworn up and down, left and right, that he’d never eat them.
Until he had to.
They’d been stuck for three days so far. The whole trip had been a catastrophe from the outset, but they had been stuck in this leaky, cold, and miserable little shack with little more than the clothes on their back and some firestarters. Dorian had rolled his ankle on the way down a hill, which normally wouldn’t be so bad, but an unexpected batch of storms had picked up and left them stranded halfway to Denerim and miles away from their checkpoint. It was actually miserable. Normally Cullen could keep his own spirits up for Dorian’s sake, but there wasn’t much he could do when they were cold and wet and hungry.
“I should go out and try to find us something,” Cullen murmured against Dorian’s neck. They’d been curled up together since they’d woken from a brief sleep earlier in attempt to stay warm, and Cullen rather liked the feeling of being tucked in against Dorian’s skin.
The other man shook his head, “No,” he murmured, “it’s cold without you here.”
Cullen sighed and wrapped his arm more closely around Dorian. Since the fall he’d been a little, well, clingy. The cold and the wet probably had a lot to do with that too, since normally Dorian was one to want to be left alone when he didn’t feel well. That said, the man’s ankle was swollen and purple, despite them having wrapped it as best they could. Stopping for some time was probably better than pushing on with it, but…stuck. Three days. They had a couple of protein bars to share that would probably buy them another day or two at a stretch, but they needed something else.
“I’m just going to go have a look around,” Cullen promised, “I’ll be back in ten minutes.”
Dorian huffed a bit for that, but nodded, “Fine.”
The search was wet and cold and uncomfortable. For all that it could have at least been successful. Useful. No pointless. And yet. Cullen was soaked to the bone and shivering by the time he closed the metal door behind him and immediately started pulling off wet clothes. His hands were shaking with the effort of it, and when he was out of all of them he crawled into the bedroll he and dorian had been sharing so he could press his cold, wet body against Dorian’s.
“Anything?” Dorian asked as he immediately wound his hand in Cullen’s wet hair and wince as he shuffled closer.
Cullen shook his head and rested his forehead back in against Dorian’s shoulder, “We’ll just have to hope it lets up soon so we can…get somewhere.”
That hand in his hair tightened just a little before Dorian turned to look down at him, “Well, it’s a good thing my search ended up better,” he teased.
“Your search?” Cullen asked, “you’re in the same spot you were in when I left.”
Dorian grinned, “Yes, and while you were out getting soaked I managed to crack open that footlocker we found,” he answered, “which is the kind of searches I like: the kind I don’t have to move for unless I have to.”
“And you found something?”
“Well, depending on what you’re interpretation of the word ‘food’ is,” Dorian went on as he waved a hand, and reached off to the side to pull out a faded cardboard box that was mercifully dry and covered with the moderately well-known mascot of one of their anthropomorphized cakes wearing a gingham dress. Cullen’s eyes widened and he looked from Dorian to the box in his hand. It was full, which meant there were ten of those glorious pre-packaged cakes in there. They had all the water they could drink, too.
Maker, they might actually make it out of this. Mostly.
Cullen ripped into the package immediately and pulled out two of the individually wrapped cakes, “You’re amazing, you know that?” he asked Dorian as he kissed the other man’s cheek and put one of the cakes in his hand, “eat that. I don’t want to hear you argue.”
At that, Dorian just rolled his eyes, but he ripped open the plastic wrap to smell what was inside before he made a face, “These are fucking vile,” he told Cullen.
“They’re nice!” he argued as he tore into his own and pointedly took a bite. They were every bit as sugary sweet as he remembered and he could have eaten the whole pack, especially with some coffee. Cullen smiled as he watched Dorian take a bite, make a face as he chewed, then watched Dorian’s shoulders slump.
“What?” Cullen asked, “is it alright? Does it taste weird?”
Dorian made another face then, and took another, slightly larger bite, “No,” he answered. He almost sounded embarrassed if it weren’t for the cake and cream in his mouth. “It’s…actually really good.”