Work Text:
The sweet taste of ocean air on Wifies’s tongue is enough to pull him from an uneasy sleep. He sits up and stretches. On the awkwardly placed bed beside him, Hummer is hunched over, scribbling verdicts into a book with ink-stained hands.
“Oh, you’re finally up!” He greets a yawning Wifies.
Wifies rubs his eyes, taking in the blazing sunrise around him and the rhythmic sway of the ship in the waves. “How long have I been asleep?”
“Uh,” Hummer says, “three hours? Four?”
“Good to know.” Wifies lends him a glare behind which is a soft, teasing smile.
Clearing his throat, Hummer taps his fingers along the leather cover, and laughs, “Yeah, sorry for keeping you up so late. Levi doesn’t wait! He never waits.”
Wifies runs his hand through his hair. Still soggy. The saltwater clings to those dark locks, and so does a bit of slimy kelp. He pulls the sweatband off his forehead and wrings it until his shirt and lap are damp from the squeezed-out droplets. There’s no hope anyways. His entire bed is wet from whatever he tracked in from the ocean.
“Tell me, Hummer, have you ever considered bringing towels on your boat? Or does the Leviathan consider that a lack of faith?” Wifies asks.
Hummer chuckles, slamming the book shut and shuffling himself onto his feet, “Y-you know you could have just told me you needed one!”
“I asked for one last night!” Wifies snaps back, a playful grin growing on his tanned face.
“Didn’t hear you!” His TV head flickering with steely resolve, Hummer drops his arm into a chest and rummages around. A few saplings, crystals, and chunks of rock clatter onto the floor until he pulls out something that can only be described as a weathered, tired rag. “One towel, coming right up!”
“This is not what I asked for,” Wifies mumbles, eyeing the ‘towel’ gingerly balanced in Hummer’s clutches.
He isn’t given a second to react before Hummer plops down beside him and begins mussing his hair with that thing.
“Hummer! Wait!” Wifies pulls away and grabs Hummer’s wrist. “Are you really sure, like, sure that this will work?”
Gently undoing Wifies’s grip, Hummer leans forward and looks him right in the eyes. “Do you trust me, Wifies?”
There’s a creeping cloud of rouge along Wifies’s cheeks as he nods. “Y-yes! Of course…well, sort of, yeah. Yeah!” He inwardly prays he’s not too flustered. But as sharp as he is, Hummer is also oblivious. Incredibly oblivious.
“Good!” The uplift in Hummer’s voice makes it obvious he’s smiling.
Hummer lifts the towel onto Wifies’s hair and continues drying it. Wifies seems to melt into that touch, his panicked breaths slowing against the back and forth rub of the fabric on his head. Hummer is surprisingly warm. The subsiding chill of nighttime is pleasant against his buzzing static and meticulous fingers. As he works, he tucks in those stray strands of hair that tickle Wifies’s forehead, sending a jolt of molten red along his face. Within two minutes, Wifies’s head is completely dry.
“Oh, uh thanks!”
“It’s nothing, really.” Hummer drops the towel and wraps his arms around his friend’s shoulders. “I’m glad you’re here, to well, search for Levi with me. You know, it’s like, super lonely without you.”
Slowly, Wifies dissolves into the hug. “Honored.”
“Good! Now let’s not dilly-dally!”
“Huh?”
“Back into the ocean we go!”