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Just like that, it was over. The crowd whooped and cheered for the band as they were showered in roses and a myriad of other flowers, Berdly preened himself on all the attention he was getting all the while. Still, it wasn't long before they all walked offstage to switch out of their costumes.
Berdly fiddled with his specially fitted fingerless (digit-featherless?) gloves, somehow struggling to undo the velcro that helped them stay on his wings without coming off due to his lack of a proper wrist. Damned feathers. He would try at it with his beak, if it didn't feel so embarrassing to resort to such a thing. The gloves might make him look cool, but they were too inconvenient.
As he was about to give up and accept that he'd have to resort to prying it off in a less dignified way, a light tap on the shoulder nearly made him jump, head swiveling around to face the source.
As expected, he came face to face with his dastardly rival, still clad in their glamorous rockstar costume, their lips quirked up in a small smirk. All they'd done was set their guitar down - clearly, they were in no hurry to change back into battle-appropriate wear.
(Berdly wished they'd ditch the outfit once and for all. The glittery fabric was highly attention-grabbing. His eyes had drifted to it one too many times already.)
‘Need help?’ Kris signed casually.
The bluebird searched for their eyes under their bangs (just to make sure they weren't twinkling with mischief, of course), but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't see them. He scoffed derisively at their question, turning his body on its axis to face them.
“As if!” he snorted with a roll of his eyes. “Do you think of me as that unintelligent? I am perfectly capable of changing out of my costume myself.”
‘Those gloves are kicking your ass.’ they huffed out a little laugh as they signed, trying and failing to keep their lips pursed in a neutral expression.
“How crass.” the bluebird snarked, sarcasm dripping from each word. “For the record, I was just about to get them off, before you oh so helpfully decided to come pester me.”
Kris made a move like they were about to sign another response, but all of a sudden, their fingers twitched as if they'd been zapped, and instead, they reached out to him in a clunky, stuttery way. Their hands made their way to his wings in a flash, and Berdly didn't have enough time to pull away before they took one of them in a surprisingly gentle, though fidgety, hold.
Berdly made an indescribable noise in the back of his throat, beak agape as his face warmed. Kris's own face seemed to be flushed as well, their gaze downcast enough that he certainly had no chance of seeing their eyes now. Slowly, almost agonizingly so, they reached out to the “wrist” area of his gloves and began pulling back the velcro, the sound of it being ripped off the only thing hanging in the air at that moment. Then, just as delicately, they pulled the glove off.
The bluebird's feathers bristled, SOUL hammering in his chest at just how close Kris was to him. The annoyingly noticeable cinnamon-scented perfume they'd spritzed on at Tenna's insistence had spread through the air so thoroughly it was starting to make him feel lightheaded. If this was a prank, it was not funny.
(The way their fingers brushed tantalizingly over his feathers made them stand up with goosebumps. He decided not to think too much about this.)
“You did well out there.” his rival murmured, catching Berdly wholly off guard with the rumbly sound of their voice.
…Huh.
They'd… spoken.
His breath hitched in surprise, eyes flickering away from where he'd been staring at Kris's hand on his wing, now moving to the other after discarding the removed glove carelessly. He still couldn't see their face well, but they looked like they were trembling.
“Ah- W-well, you- You weren't half bad yourself!” he stammered, praying to the Angel above that they wouldn't notice his feathers rising even further. “Nearly on my level, honestly!”
“Really?” Kris drawled teasingly. The bluebird was almost certain they were sliding their fingers over his feathers like that on purpose. “Because I certainly recall you missing a lot of notes.”
Berdly let out another embarrassing noise, attempting to counteract it with a frustrated huff. This just made Kris snicker as they removed his other glove seamlessly, dropping it to the ground as well.
“What were you so distracted about, hm?” they prodded him, still lingering, still teasing, and still far too close.
(That melodic tone was going to get them in deep trouble someday. He'd get back at them as soon as he figured out how to blow away the maddeningly debilitating brain fog that currently plagued him.)
“Now is not the time for your drivel.” he replied sharply. “We have a game show to finish.”
“Are you avoiding the question?”
“There's nothing to answer it with!”
“Is that so?” Kris leaned into his field of vision. Their hair swooped to the side as they tilted their head and Berdly's SOUL nearly stopped for a second when he saw their eyes unobstructed. “Or are you just embarrassed?”
Berdly glared at them, a growl bubbling in the back of his throat. They must have thought they were being soooo slick with their taunts, crooning their words in that tone of voice with that sort of stance, so close to him that he could almost feel their body warmth. They must have thought that their flashy outfit and styled hair and cinnamon perfume and hot-pink eyes made them attractive enough to get away with whatever the hell they wanted at that moment. Well, they didn't! Angel, he wanted to wipe that look off their smug face.
“Good lord, just-” he let out a hissing exhale through his clenched beak, fighting to ignore the dizziness that was beginning to plague him. “Shut up already!”
Kris looked up at him blankly. At such an angle, no longer hunched in their typical stance, he could finally see their eyes, magenta in color for an inexplicable reason and looking weirdly resolute. Slowly, they took a couple of shaky steps back, screwed their eyes shut, and inhaled deeply, unmoving. While checking their body language to see if he'd done something wrong, brows furrowed in confusion, he noticed their hands clenched tight next to their hips.
After what felt like hours, their expression softened and they opened their eyes again. They took one, two steps forward, and Berdly fought the urge to back away in turn, eyes glued to his rival's. When they decided they were close enough, their eyes narrowed ever so slightly and their mouth curled into a very familiar cheeky smirk, teeth poking out.
(Berdly was reminded of their midnight-blue lipstick, for whatever reason.)
“Make me.” they said lowly.
Berdly's SOUL skipped a beat. Then another. He worried it'd skip a third one, but thankfully it resumed its usual thrumming soon enough.
Still, he had to fight to keep it at a normal rate as the human's words washed over him and he finally processed just what they'd said. They were just standing there now, smirking ever so slightly at him, looking stupidly attractive in ways Berdly had never previously considered.
Ways that had his SOUL thrumming almost melodically. Ways that made him feel lightheaded and pleasantly warm under his feathers.
Ways that were daring him to do something monumentally stupid.
Whatever. He was dreaming, wasn't he? He could afford to be unintelligent if it was just a dream. It's not like anyone was really watching him. His clean record of good decisions would not be tainted by something that wasn't happening.
And besides, Susie and Ralsei were nowhere to be seen. They'd probably already finished up and left. It was just the two of them backstage. Just Kris, Berdly, and the all-consuming compulsion he was beginning to experience just standing there in front of them, truly taking them in, so close to their lean frame and soft-looking face it was making his head spin.
He thought of the stupidest things he could possibly do at that moment. A myriad of options presented themselves, each more ridiculous than the last. His brain settled on grabbing Kris's striped shirt, tilting his head to the side, and closing the gap between his beak and their lips.
Kris froze in surprise at Berdly's action. The bluebird got to relish in the feeling of catching his opponent off guard for about three seconds, before immediately getting a taste of his own medicine when Kris pulled him closer to them.
Suddenly, they were kissing back.
Oh Angel above they were kissing back.
Whatever high ground the bluebird had by initiating the activity was instantly ripped away from him as Kris put a hand to his cheek, pressed him against the wall, and kissed him completely senseless. His rival was determined, suddenly invigorated by Berdly's stupid decision, and he could do nothing substantial about it.
And the worst part was, Berdly let them. In that moment, stuck in a dreamscape of his own making, he was completely and utterly floating. On cloud nine, one could say. Metaphorically. Or something. He didn't care. It was hard to do so when the quiet hums of contentment coming from both of them were the only information his brain was retaining.
If there had been something negative he'd said about the current situation, he was going back on it. This was incredible. Kris's breaths, their lips (oh Angel he was thinking about their lipstick again), the soft noise of another intake of air rippling through the air whenever either of them had to break the link to take a quick breath… it drove him insane with the need to keep it going for as long as possible. He was deranged for ever having been against it in the first place. Whatever the hell it was that was happening, he never wanted it to stop.
…Unfortunately, his dream decided to be at least vaguely rooted in reality, so before long, he had to pull away for good, wheezing like he'd ran a marathon - or at least attempted to. With his hazy mind now clearing up again, he blamed any consequential thoughts about how attractive Kris looked under the spotlights on his lightheadedness due to a lack of oxygen flowing into his brain.
Kris pulled back as well, staring at him through their bangs. Their hand still lingered near Berdly's face, though, and it was making him disgustingly unfocused. The bluebird attempted to keep his breathing in check, fighting the will of his own SOUL to look away from his rival's face and stop searching for their eyes under their hair.
This was fine. This was fine. He had a minor lapse of judgement. He caved into indulgence. Whatever. Happens to the best and brightest. No one had been around to see him lose himself to his rival until he was seconds away from moaning out their name, and no one would know it even happened, because this wasn't real. In any case, he was normal now. He wasn't thinking about it anymore. He could say words properly.
“Usually this is the part where I, ah…” he swallowed dryly. “w-wake up.”
…Alright, so maybe he was still a little out of it. So what? It'd pass. As soon as his limbs decided to work. As soon as he got far enough away from Kris that the urge to feel their lips on his beak again didn't keep trying to entice him into caving. As soon as he could take his eyes off of the dark lipstick smudged across the corner of their mouth, a color that his beak certainly donned now.
(He wanted to see just how much further he could smear it across their face. How pretty they'd look after it was ruined.)
He was suddenly keenly aware of the fact that Kris was running their fingers through the feathers between his neck and his jaw absently. His face burned with embarrassment and the thumping of his SOUL increased tenfold. They were not helping in the slightest.
“You've dreamt about this?” his rival spoke up, sounding genuinely surprised. Their fingers stopped ruffling Berdly's feathers, and he cursed the fact that he was almost willing to tell them to keep going.
“Wh- O-of course not!” the bluebird replied hurriedly, urging himself to shimmy out of Kris's grip but still unable to find it in him to actually do so. “I-I was merely trying to, er. Emulate. A common trope. T-to see if it would, uh. Work.”
Kris snorted under their breath. Berdly thought he could almost see a hint of their striking eyes behind their bangs, but he wasn't sure.
“So did it work?” they teased, leaning even closer. Their lipstick was all he could think about now. This was bad. Very bad.
Berdly's useless brain had to be reeled back like a dog on a leash to prevent him from kissing Kris again. The tips of their fingers were back to scritching under his feathers, drawing a rumbling noise the bluebird was most certainly not proud of out of him.
“I suppose not.” Berdly breathed quietly. “Because your words are no longer annoying me, and yet I still want to kiss you.”
Kris's smooth tone and gentle petting had him acting like a complete fool. He was fully aware of that fact. But what were dreams if not indulgent? Nothing was preventing him from making the most of his situation. To hell with trying to act normal, fighting back the urge to lose himself in their embrace until his dream inevitably faded into nothingness. Maybe it would cause complications the following morning, when he woke up yearning for Kris's touch, wishing he could just go back to sleep as his SOUL hammered wildly in his chest, but he'd get better. He could afford to be stupid and make bad decisions for once.
At least the Kris in his dreams seemed to be equally as idiotic, because they perked up ever so slightly in what seemed like surprise before sending him a stupid teasing look.
“And wanting to kiss me is a dream thing?” Berdly could imagine his rival raising an eyebrow under their bangs.
“Naturally.” the bluebird scoffed. As if they had to ask. Awake-Berdly was much too smart for this nonsense.
Kris hummed thoughtfully. “So if you want to kiss me…”
Berdly flinched as he felt Kris shift in front of him, one of their magenta eyes in view - which was how he knew this wasn't real. It shone warmly, dancing like a lithium flame, and Berdly felt like he'd melt into a puddle of goop if he kept staring into it.
(He didn't let that stop him.)
“And I want to kiss you…”
“Dream-Kris wants to kiss me.” Berdly corrected almost bitterly. He was immediately silenced by the feeling of Kris's hand lightly hovering above his waist, only barely touching his jacket in a way that drove him crazy.
“Why don't we… make the most of it?” the human finished.
Kris halted their movement, pulled back only a little bit, allowing Berdly to back off if he wasn't up for… whatever this was. But Berdly knew that wasn't the wish he was aiming to fulfill here. Before they could give him any more space, he pulled them back in, allowing their lips to meet his beak once again.
Yeah. Making the most of it sounded really good right about now.
Berdly felt fully in control this time. The reminder to himself that this was naught but a dream fueled him like gasoline, making use of all of his free will and carefully measured boldness to take the reins of the situation and pull Kris to him, hold their waist between his wings, fight back against the push they were giving him to back up against the wall.
His rival was persistent, though. Their quick breaths teetered on quiet growls of frustration when he kept fighting for control, and their chains of kisses made way for something deeper when they pulled back for a bigger intake of air and captured his beak with their lips full-force, confident and earnest and possessive in the way that they squeezed his cheeks softly to prompt him to open his beak wider.
To his chagrin, he didn't need much prompting at all, immediately loosening the leash on his primal brain and allowing his rival to kiss him deeper, to once again press him into the wall so firmly their chest was almost touching his. He couldn't help it - this dream may allow him the boldness to take control himself, but his true fantasy was to be wanted.
(His brain really did know how to mock him, didn't it?)
Kris pulled away with a sharp inhale and a wet noise that should have made Berdly shudder with more disgust than enthusiasm, then stared him down, panting, cheeks flushed. This time, their magenta eyes were in full view, the pupils dilated beyond what the bluebird realized was possible, and it instantly made swarms upon swarms of butterflies infest his chest cavity until he felt too dizzy to breathe, too hazy to remain aware of his surroundings.
Everything blurred around Kris - unkempt hair, lean frame and enticing, lightly swollen lips had become Berdly's full focus in record time. They looked absolutely beautiful standing in front of him, enhanced by the bluish light shining down on them and the smudged lipstick trailing towards their cheek. Or maybe that was the high of making out with them - oh god he was making out with them - messing with his cognitive ability. He couldn't be sure, and he didn't particularly care at the moment.
Before he was ready for it, Kris's pretty face left his field of view as they leaned forward and ducked down, Berdly's inner question of what they were thinking immediately answered by the feeling of their lips on his neck, peppering the surface area in kisses so light they nearly drove Berdly insane. He'd just learned about this maddening sensation, and he already wanted so much more.
“Please.” was the first thing he could think to say, the only thing he could bring himself to say. He felt pathetic, trembling with debilitating anticipation while desperately trying to ignore just how pitiful he sounded, pleading with his rival to just do what they clearly wanted to do already and stop teasing him, even now.
They weren't feeling that mean, at least. When Berdly's needy warble of a plea clawed itself out of his voicebox and hung in the air, Kris's breath caught in their throat for just a split second and their teeth buried themselves in his neck with no hesitation, harshly dragging them along the skin in a way that felt like they were tearing it without actually doing so.
Berdly breathed out their name in a strained whisper like a secret between the two of them, though his SOUL wanted nothing more than to scream it between the chirrup that threatened to spill out. Kris mumbled his name in turn, right into the sensitive skin on his neck, feeling so much more vulnerable without his signature battle armor. They gnawed and tugged at it, and Berdly's second attempt at calling out to them got lost in translation when it was cut off by a warble of bliss.
He could feel a dull throb of pain spreading through the last area his rival had latched their mouth onto, absolutely nothing like the pain he'd felt whenever he took damage in their battles during the Marvelous Mystery Board. Kris was marking him, clear as day, and such a simple fact was making him feel like his SOUL was about to burst in his chest with how hard it was beating.
“So you don't forget who you belong to.” they whispered, breaths so ragged their voice approached a snarl.
(He'd love it if he was never allowed to forget, but real life was never that kind.)
“Yours.” the word spilled out of him like a confession, breathy and almost filthy with how close to a moan it sounded. He couldn't stop the rest of his sentence from tumbling out of him. “I'm yours, Kris. I'll always be yours, just please-”
They bit him again, a full-on bite as opposed to tiny nips and suckles for once. Berdly tightened his grip on their lower back so much that he pulled them into him, too distracted by every sensation coursing through his body to care. Kris's sharp breaths felt like too much and not enough when they made contact with the plumage of his neck, and Berdly was positive he'd do whatever they asked of him at that moment.
Lucid dreams truly were unfair, weren't they? It all seemed so real. It all sounded so real. He could feel his rival's face as if they were actually there in front of him, savor the addicting taste of their lips, hear them breathe sweet nothings into his mouth clear as day. And it all felt so… good.
(That was a bad sign. He'd likely relive this more than normal after waking up.)
He was losing his bearings. He couldn't focus on anything besides Kris and the hands that had wandered down to his hips to pull him even closer. He was so out of it, in fact, that he barely even noticed a familiar voice approaching, feeling far away with everything else that was happening.
“Kris! Berdly! What in the world are you still doing here?! Susie and Ralsei have been ready for-”
The voice abruptly cut off just as the crackling sound of static rang in the air, startling both the bluebird and his rival into turning their likely equally flushed faces towards the source. They were met with a familiar cathode ray tracing television, somehow bristling like a cat and gawking at their… display.
Silence hung in their air for a moment, Tenna standing in place and maintaining his absolutely flabbergasted expression and inexplicable bristling. Finally, he moved into about twelve different poses in the span of three seconds, making a separate different noise of befuddlement for each one of them, before he clutched his face with his hands with his jaw halfway down to the 8th circle of hell.
“That is not appropriate for our TV-Y7 show!” he screeched, visibly horrified despite the complete lack of eyes.
All of a sudden, before Berdly could process it, everything went dark.
When the world reformed around him again, he was back in his much more comforting suit of armor, standing in the Green Room while vertigo muddled his brain like he'd been dropped into it. After a short while of gathering his bearings and trying to push away all of the complicated feelings brought on by kissing Kris until both of them forgot how to breathe, he took a look around.
What he found was Kris was standing practically on the other side of the room, looking equally as startled as he felt.
Embarrassment flooded him like boiling water, his feathers fluffing as he finally allowed himself to process what the fuck had happened and everything he and Kris did together in that goddamn backstage area throttled him full-force. How could he be so stupid?! How could he allow himself to indulge this much, knowing full well how hard it would be to forget about when it dawned?!
He couldn't allow himself to think about it further. He didn't even dare to question it at this point. Any hint of reminiscence would entice him into wanting it again, and if he wanted it again he'd want it more when he woke up and it would ruin him because this isn't real it would never happen so why would he ever let himself hope that Kris would actually want to-
“Berdly?”
The bluebird yelped, jumping a good two feet into the air with the startle. That was the last voice he'd expected to hear during his inner spiraling. His head swiveled around to come face to face with Susie, whose eyes visibly widened ever so slightly once she got a proper look at him, and Ralsei, blank-faced and silent, standing politely next to her.
“What is it that you need from me, dear Susan?” he crooned in his most coherent attempt at a smugly superior tone, hoping that his smirk looked more real than it felt.
The saurian just… stared at him. Scrutinizingly, like she was trying to pinpoint a mistake in his form. Her amber eyes scanned his face for a while, narrowed into slits, before her brows furrowed and she opened them again. One of her paws came to rest on his shoulder (well, “rest” was too light of a word - she'd practically slammed it down), pure, unfiltered honesty emanating from the action.
“Dude, midnight blue is not your color.” she jabbed gruffly, but her tone was deeply genuine. “'S too close to your feathers. And uh, do you even know… how to put on makeup? 'Cuz your attempts look kinda pathetic.”
Berdly, idiot that he was, came far too close to asking her what in the world she was talking about. Just when he opened his mouth to do so, though, he realized, and the skin under his feathers immediately reached the temperature of a radiator and he narrowly avoided flaunting his flushed face to his two temporary teammates, managing to spread a wing in front of it to hide his fluster. Good lord, this was embarrassing. How was it that Tenna switched his costume out but didn't get rid of the myriad of lipstick stains that surely populated the area above his collarbone?!
“I don't suppose you'll ever truly understand the workings of a genius.” he sniffed, deliberately avoiding eye contact with the saurian.
Susie scoffed, mimicking his tone mockingly under her breath, and proceeded to ignore him, pacing to the other side of the room where Kris stood. In his journey to not look at her (or at Kris) as much as possible, his eyes trailed down to the dark prince, still standing in place with the same blank expression on his face. The two made hesitant eye contact, Berdly's brows furrowing.
Ralsei blinked. Berdly blinked back. Nothing was shared between the two.
“Okay.” the goat monster said simply, before making his way back to Kris's side as well.