Work Text:
The small cave Pix had set up as his work station while he was uncovering what he had named the Ancient Capital was not the most comfortable place to live. As evidenced by the crick in his neck that made him wince in pain every time he turned his head to the side. That damn bed that he had made from whatever materials he could find definitely wasn't ergonomic. Finally, with a sharp twist, he felt his vertebrae pop and he got some relief. It probably wasn’t the smartest thing to perform unsanctioned chiropracty on himself, but it got the job done.
Now that his neck was somewhat in order, he could focus on the record keeping papers and small objects of archaeological importance scattered around the desk he was seated at. While cataloging the artifacts he found on his dig wasn’t all monotonously boring, Pix could feel he wasn’t in the right headspace right now to be doing it. He could feel his vision getting blurry as he blinked the sleep out of his eyes. He had been up since dawn cataloging these things, and he was getting, well, bored was an understatement.
“Come on Pix. Just two more cataloged and you can start the excavation of the tombs again.” The self pep-talk and the promise of the more exciting aspect of his job got him just enough energy where he could finish writing the minute details of the minute objects before standing up from his chair and stretching. The yawn that snuck up on him made his eyes tear up a little.
“I think it's time for a cup of coffee.” puttering around the makeshift kitchen space, he sets up the manual coffee press he made for himself when he first settled into the dig space and loads it with coffee grounds. Thankfully, Pix had set up a small scale trade with Sausage for a supply of coffee beans when he gave the man froglights.
Along with being beautiful lights, froglights from his orchard, when dried, taste excellent in Pix’s coffee blend, as well as providing some extra caffeine.
Sitting down at the desk he was just working at, he clears the artifacts into a safe, climate controlled box and sets up his breakfast, consisting of a steaming cup of coffee and a sliced fresh froglight. The soft silence of the Ancient Capital comes back into the cave after he is finished making his meal, comforting and isolating at the same time. Pix has always enjoyed quiet and peace, but occasionally, it just becomes too silent. He’s still a human (in a manner of speaking) and as such, he craves connection. The other emperors visit sometimes, but it's always just visits, and those don’t even come all that often.
With a sigh, Pix stands up from the desk after eating and ruminating on his lonely life, to leave his temporary home. He can see the bright savannah sunlight streaming through the impromptu windows in the acacia door he put on the cave entrance. Stepping out into the blinding mid-morning light, Pix smiles. For some unknown reason he just can’t put his finger on, he feels like today is going to be very productive. Maybe he’ll find an artifact finally helping him understand some of the chthonic practices of those who originally inhabited these lands!
After a short hike up the small hill, the massive statue leaning over the catacombs comes into view, wings spread like a guardian angel. Her gaze has followed Pix ever since he came here, always bringing a sense of Deja Vu that he just can’t grasp. Shaking his head to clear the thought from his head, his tousled hair finds its way into his eyes. He really needed to cut it again. Or maybe he should’ve just brought a hair tie so it wouldn’t annoy him when he was working.
The cold, musty air hits him like a wall when he steps into the antechamber. The dryness of the savannah had helped preserve this city, but it still had enough moisture to give a chill when Pix found himself descending past the surface. He had left most of the site in situ, but he had put up some torches on the walls in removable brackets, so as to not damage the closely fitted bricks that made up the walls. He also didn’t want to add another layer of carbon to the historical torch holders, just in case they were considered significant enough to carbon date later on. The torches he had added had thankfully put some life back into the place, along with enough light to see and just a little bit of warmth.
Sadly, he wanted to head to one of the deeper sections he had left unexplored, which meant that there would be no signs of human inhabitance for the last ~600 years. Bracing to head into the dark of the undiscovered tunnels in front of him, Pix lights his hand-held torch and pulls out a cream colored candle from his inventory. It's a weird tradition, but he always has the urge to light a candle at the start of each stretch of unexplored catacomb. Whatever the purpose, it makes for a useful marker for how far he got exploring each day, along with providing an anchor point where he can go back to to know where he started.
“My own version of Ariadne’s thread in a way, I guess. If only it was given to me by a beautiful person wanting to marry me. I wouldn’t be like Theseus, that's for sure.” He snickers to himself, taking comfort in his static knowledge of the past, before heading into the unknown future.
It wasn’t nearly as sudden of a change as he always psychs himself up for. It was honestly just like stepping into the same corridor as he had just been standing in. But it was always a good idea for an archaeologist to have a reverence for the past and the places they explore and the artifacts they collect. When Pix explored new sections, he always just did an exploratory walk through first, without digging too deeply into any of the mysteries he inevitably walked past. He gave himself the rule of not touching anything during these first pass-throughs, so as to not let himself be sucked into studying one thing for hours, forgetting everything else for the rest of the day.
When walking through the corridors, he quickly jotted down a mental note of how the accent colors in this section switched from a more blueish tint to a verdant green.
“Maybe a different socio-economic class burial location? Or maybe they lost their access to the blue dye as they dug deeper and buried more people?” His musings echoed eerily across the walls that had not heard a human voice in the past who-knows-how-long.
Pix’s eyes narrow. That echo doesn’t seem to be going away. And the echo doesn’t sound like his voice anymore. Instead, it sounds like someone's muffled struggling further down the corridor. His eyebrows crease even further as he realizes just how foolish his former thought sounds.
“How in any of the hells would someone be down here? No one except me has stepped in this part of the catacombs, at least to my knowledge. If one of the emperors explored down here there would be lights and more signs.” As Pix tries to puzzle out the predicament, the muffled sounds only get stronger. “Ah, fuck it.” He sets his mind to investigating, even if the answer is that he’s just finally going insane and beginning to hear voices.
Speedwalking down the hallway, still carefully stepping as to not disturb the in situ nature of the site, he gets closer to the noises. He has to turn a corner to get to the source, but when he does, the sight takes him away.
A gleaming gold inlay of a woman with her hand raised to the sun above, pointing a sickle down to the earth rests on the wall. Her green dress made out of mosaic tiles only somewhat faded from time. When Pix turns his torch slightly to the left however, his breath catches in his throat. On the woman’s back rests massive golden wings, the tiles covered by the gold foil flickering with torch-light.
For a moment, Pix forgets the voice to his left. Then, with an exceptionally loud “hmmph!”, his attention is snapped back to whatever lured him here in the first place. Turning from the frieze with a reluctant glance, he looks at what appears to be a sarcophagus, same as the others that line the walls arriving here. He crouches down to peer at the inscription. Each one of the burial locations has a personal name as well as a short epitaph. Sadly, Pix hasn’t made much headway on the script or language of the people that settled this area, so he can’t make out much more than,
“— Fox
The — lord, forever —
— just.”
Another harrumph comes from the sarcophagus, sounding increasingly annoyed. Pix startles out of his focus on translating the difficult text and almost falls on his ass. Thankfully he regains his balance and doesn’t make a fool of himself. Not that the person inside the coffin would notice.
With a cringe, Pix slides the lid off the sarcophagus with a heave. Luckily, Pix has gained quite a bit of muscle from strenuous archaeological work. carrying heavy artifacts, holding himself in uncomfortable positions, and other activities that took much more physical strength than one might expect of an archaeologist have led to Pix gaining some mass.
When he stares down at the newly opened casket, he is surprised to find an actual human person. Even with the sounds, Pix wasn’t completely sure it was going to be an alive person. And a very attractive one at that. He had a tight red t-shirt on, jeans held up by suspenders, and long brown hair cascading past his shoulders. And strangely enough, dog ears folded against the top of the coffin. Pix is reduced to staring at the man looking up at him with wide eyes, feeling like he should do something, but his brain malfunctioning with a mix of discombobulation and attraction stops any thoughts in their tracks. The man makes a muffled sound again, and Pix finally focuses on the situation in front of him. A root seems to have forced itself into the man's mouth, blocking any sound from escaping.
“How long have you been in here?” Pix mutters more to himself than to the man, but he responds with a “mmm.” nonetheless. The man shifts in his deeply uncomfortable bed once again, and Pix’s eyes widen.
“Sorry! I really should do something!” He sifts through his inventory, trying to find anything that would help cut the root.
“An axe wouldn’t work, I don’t want to cut you, maybe shears?” The man vigorously nods his head, or at least as much as he can with a root impeding his head's movement, discouraging the use of the axe.
It takes a while, but the shears eventually manage to cut the root and free the man. He spits out the remnants of the root with a “bleh” and sits up.
“Woah.” He grips onto either side of his prison and he tilts his head back and closes his eyes. “Sitting up after however long that was causes some serious blood pressure changes, let me tell you. Took you long enough to free me.” A smirk takes up one corner of the man's mouth and Pix can hear a soft swish on the bottom of the sarcophagus. Pix leans forward and takes a look inside, only to be greeted with a fluffy brown tail wagging against the rough stone. “Woah there. Just because you freed me doesn’t mean you get to kiss me. Not just yet anyway.” He snorts out of his nose, still smirking.
Pix leaps back, a blush rising on his face. “I didn’t mean- I- um- I just have so many questions.” Pix is out of breath by the time he finishes the rushed sentence.
“How about we start with names? Mine’s Ren by the way. You?” Pix is in awe of how Ren, apparently, is able to speak after being trapped in this place for, what, 600 years‽
“Um. My name is Dr. Pix L. Riffs.” Pix’s muscle memory in introducing himself comes back to himself and saves him from whatever embarrassing fate was in store for him.
“Oh! A doctor! How fancy! I hope you're alright with me just calling you Pix though. I don’t do well with authority.” Ren winks and his eye sparkles with mischief when he casually disregards Pix’s many years of studying. And for some unfathomable reason, Pix doesn’t seem to mind. Everything that comes out of Ren’s mouth seems to carry too many meanings for Pix to count, jokes from the past that he couldn’t possibly hope to understand.
“Yeah, uh, that's fine. Do you want help getting out of there?” Pix steps forward, offering his hand.
“Yeah, that would be great. Not sure how well my old legs are doing right now after all.” Pix grabs ahold of the other’s calloused hand, feeling the soft hair on the back of his hand. Yanking him up and wrapping his arm around the other's waist to keep him up, Pix can feel how cold the other man is. He’s shivering in fact. Pix tries to subtly press his body closer, trying to transfer any body heat he can into the other man through conduction.
For the first time, Ren seems more flustered than Pix. “Wow. You’re pretty strong aren’t you. Um. And, uh, very warm.” The red on both of their faces creep up past their beards and onto their cheeks.
“Lets just get you out of here. How about that?” Pix resolutely turns away from Ren, hoping not to reveal himself more than he already has. The two set off, guided by Pix’s torch and memory.
-
By the time both of them get back out into the sun-filled plains of the Ancient Capital, Ren is feeling significantly warmer, but Pix isn’t taking any chances. He also doesn’t know how long it has been since the last time Ren ate.
“Come on, my house is this way.” Steering the other man by the hand he still has wrapped around his waist (Pix’s face heats up a little at that thought, but justifies it as best he can by saying he’s keeping Ren upright.), he brings him to his hovel.
“It’s um. Quaint?” Ren is trying his hardest to not sound rude to the man that just saved him from being trapped in a coffin for all of eternity and Pix appreciated it.
“Yeah, I spend most of my time conserving and recording the ruins around here. Doesn’t leave me much time to make a nice house for myself.” Pix tried to explain away the sudden embarrassment that had taken root in his mind.
“Well, that's pretty damn respectable if I do say so myself. After all, if you hadn't been ‘conserving and recording’ you wouldn’t have been able to see this pretty face!” The smile Ren gives him just about makes him melt on his feet. Which would be not very useful considering he was the only thing holding both of them up right now.
“You know you don't have to have to keep buttering me up to have me help you, you know that right?” Now that Pix was slowly becoming more used to Ren's banter, he was slowly able to keep up. He pushed open the solid wood door and led Ren to the bed, sitting him down.
“Stay.” Pix points a foreboding finger at Ren, raising an eyebrow in challenge.
“Is that a dog joke? I'm deeply wounded” Ren presses his hand against his chest, but does stay, looking at Pix with puppy eyes. “Are you going to take care of me?”
“Of course I am, you big dope. How could I say no to those eyes? Also, you're in my house, I feel like it would be weird if I wasn't planning on taking care of you.” Pix was peeling a froglight, back turned to Ren. He could feel Ren's eyes tracking his movement, and if he was more dirty-minded, he would say Ren was staring at his ass. And he definitely wasn't showing off with subtle movements.
He spins around and hands the fruit to Ren. “Eat that while I gather some ingredients outside for dinner.” He hesitates for a second. He had only known the man for about an hour and a half so far, but the thought that just popped into his head just felt right. For the second time today, he said, “fuck it” and did something reckless.
He leaned down and kissed Ren on the forehead. “Would that count as my kiss for freeing you?” When he steps back from the quick peck, he sees Ren’s wide eyed stare. He worried he’d overstepped or misinterpreted the situation when Ren grabbed his wrist and pulled him into a full kiss on the lips.
When both of them finally pulled away, they were out of breath, smiling dumbly at each other.
“That. That was your kiss. And for some reason I don’t think it’ll be the last of them.” Pix was steadying himself on the chair, trying not to fall over from the absolute flurry of thoughts racing through his mind.
Pix was not in any shape to string any coherent words together. “Im- uh- dinner?” The doctor was rendered speechless.
“Be my guest.” Ren waved him towards his own door.
-
After a filling meal of a dodo egg omelet made with local root vegetables Pix had been growing in the natural springs flowing down from the top of the mountain, both of them had gotten into bed.
Ren was snuggled up against Pix’s chest, telling him of all of his adventures from the past. Pix was sure half of the details were embellished, but that is part of history too, is it not? Ren had a way with words, weaving even the most mundane into comedic masterpieces.
Pix smiled with his eyes closed and chuckled.
“I think I love you Ren.” The words cut across the story the man was currently telling. Pix could feel Ren’s soft hair snuggle tighter against him, tail flicking against his legs, and saw his ears flick with joy.
“I love you too Pix.”