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“You got this Oliver Poplin!” Poplin smacked his face in the mirror.
His heart was racing faster than a Spartinian, and his guts felt almost as floaty as the first time he was in a G-Force simulator. Poplin couldn’t help but feel a tad bit confused as to why he felt this lovesick, and crazy for someone. Even more confusing was how that someone ended up being Yang Wenli.
Poplin always saw himself as a ladies man. The thought of him being with a man seemed almost repulsive, but one day, he couldn’t help but pay attention at one of those boring meetings. He noticed how Yang’s smile seemed so soft on his face, how his body looked so frail, yet so easy to pick up and ruin. He noticed how Yang’s uniform pants curved around his legs, and how it perfectly shaped his ass. It was at that moment that he knew that Yang was the exception to his “females only” rule, and that he had to find a way to rip those pants off of him.
After brushing his hair with his fingers, and practicing a couple pick-up lines to himself in the mirror, he felt prepared enough to engage in his toughest battle yet. He left the bathroom, and quickly spotted Yang sitting on a barstool drinking what looked to be a glass of beer. He made his way over, preparing to work his magic.
“Cheating on Mrs. Brandy tonight, Yang?” Poplin asked, grasping Yang’s shoulder.
“Brandy is too expensive here. Julian would’ve already scolded me for spending money on liquor, but he’d be even more upset if I bought a 20 dinar glass of Brandy.”
“So you’d spend 15 on a shitty glass of beer?”
Yang laughed. “I guess so.”
Why is his laugh so cute?? Poplin could feel his face flush. Knowing he had to do something about it, Poplin decided to do a little bit of small talk.
“So how has your day been?”
“Nothing out of the ordinary. Just slaving away at paperwork, and dealing with the occasional message from the upper brass. How about you?”
“Had to train some newbies today. One of the newbies decided it would be a good idea to puke in the flight simulator, and right into the simulator’s control panel. Its crazy how one drop of liquid can break one of those things, let alone an entire bucketfull of bodily fluids. The thing is, that this isn’t even the first time this kind of thing happened. It happens at least two times per week, and you’d think they’d make a simulator that’d be resistant to this kind of thing.” Poplin waved his arm in frustration.
“They probably would have, if all of the Alliance’s engineers weren’t sent off to the front lines.” Yang sipped from his beer.
“True to that.” Poplin nodded. “Hey! Could you get me the same beer he has?” he yelled at the bartender.
“So, do you have any plans for tonight?” Poplin took a sip from his beer.
“Not really.”
“Say, I know you love sleeping. So how would you feel about sleeping with someone else tonight?” Poplin muttered, while crossing his arms to look cool. His mind was zipping around so much that he couldn’t come up with anything better to do.
Yang laughed. “Did Cazerne hire you to get me a girlfriend?”
Fuck. He didn’t pick up on it. Poplin thought, quickly trying to recoup himself.
“N-no, but I hired myself to hit on the prettiest thing in this room.” He winked at Yang.
Yang sighed. “I think you got the wrong person then.” He took a sip from his beer.
“Jeez Yang, you need to stop being so hard on yourself man. Most of Iserlohn has the hots for you, and you never take advantage of that! If I had the good looks and clout you have, I’d have a continuous revolving door of women entering my room every night! There’d be lineups outside of my room full of women waiting to get a feel of my-.” Yang placed his fingers on Poplin’s lips.
“That’s enough.” Yang sighed as he took a sip from his beer. Poplin could hear a laugh slip from Yang’s lips. “I think I get the point.”
Poplin was dumbfounded. He didn’t know what else to say. Yang’s fingers were still against his lips, and he had no idea what to do about his predicament. That was a bit of a lie. He knew exactly what he wanted to do, but it was as if his body couldn’t move to execute his plan. The magician had cast a paralyze spell on him, and Poplin couldn’t find a way to break through. Yang lifted his fingers off Poplin’s lips and yawned, the sound of which snapped Poplin out of his trance.
"Only the hottest man in the room could make me freeze like that." Poplin muttered with a smirk on his face. A soft blush started to form on Yang’s face. “You really undersell yourself Yang.”
“You seem to love repeating yourself.” Yang muttered with a smile on his face.
Dumbfounded, Poplin could only think of one thing to say. “Of course I won’t shut up about it. You deserve to be loved!” Poplin could feel a weight lift off of his chest. “And not in the wacky propaganda sense either.”
Yang gave a faint smile. “I wish that could be the case.” After drinking the rest of his beer, he got up. “I’d love to talk with you more, but Julian would get mad at me if I missed supper. He says I haven’t been eating enough real food… Actually, I think Julian said he was making irish stew, and we usually get a lot of leftovers from just the two of us eating it. I don’t think he’d mind his instructor coming over for dinner.”
A cheeky grin slipped on Poplin’s face. “So you’ll accept my offer after supper?”
“No, but I wouldn’t mind having a couple drinks with you after the meal.”
That’s enough of a win for me. Poplin thought.