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WHO: Rupert & Jonas
WHERE: Jeopardy 001
WHEN: The evening of that literal car crash of a day
WHAT: It's hurt/comfort but everything is German and time is fake
WARNINGS: ~~Not yet but Hentzau gonna Hentz~~ soft boy nsfw

Rupert refuses to do anything as pedestrian as die in his bed, considering he hasn't lived the life he has to earn such a boring death. But the shaking won't stop, even after polishing off a bottle of wine between them, and Rupert has a sneaking suspicion that the headache currently wringing his brain inside out isn't to do with the wine.

Still, despite all of this, Rupert refuses to see a doctor. Even as he's stumbling up the stairs towards his room, half-pulled and half-pushed by Jonas, Rupert is bloody-minded.

"I'm telling you - this, this is nothing," He insists with forced brightness between clenched teeth as he leans heavily against Jonas, staggering up the staircase. Every single bone in his body feels bruised, right to the marrow. "I could tell you stories - God! I've suffered worse, so much worse. I promise you, this will not be the death of me. There's no need for a doctor..."

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“Do you want me to stay?”

If Rupert can’t be persuaded to seek care from a professional, there seems to be no other option for Jonas. It would be despicable of him to leave Rupert alone for the night when the danger remains. He could die in his sleep and no one would be here to prevent it.

Rupert doesn't need Jonas to stay (or so his concussed, stubborn brain tells him) but of course he'd like him to stay. His gaze falls from the ceiling to meet Jonas's with a wicked, knowing grin; regardless of what Jonas's offer truly means, Rupert is determined to take the lowest interpretation.

"If you like," He replies coyly, his voice barely more than a murmur. Rupert throws out an arm, running a hand over the expanse of his double bed and pointedly smoothing out the sheets.

"There's plenty of room for two..."

The implication sails right over Jonas's head. He's spent over a year sleeping in the strangest places with the strangest people, none of whom had ulterior motives. It doesn't even occur to him that this could be an invitation for anything other than sleep.

So, naively, he sinks down onto the bed beside Rupert. He's right. There is plenty of room for two. Settling in comfortably, Jonas lies on his back and folds his arms over his chest - a habit rather than a necessity, considering how narrow he is.

Oh. That was... easier than Rupert expected. A lot easier. There's plenty of room for Jonas on the bed but Rupert shifts a little - rolling on his side, head pillowed over his folded arms - to give him more space. And to get a better look at him, up close. To inspect his profile, to marvel at the sculpture-perfect form of his lips, his cheeks.

He lies quietly for a moment, his gaze heavy on Jonas's face and his thoughts slow and hazy from good wine (and maybe a little bit of delayed onset shock), before gently breaking the silence to say:

"Look at me, Jonas."

Jonas very nearly dozes off as soon as his head hits the pillow, and his attention is slow to drag over. At those only half-understood words, he blinks his eyes open and turns his face toward Rupert, surprised to find him staring already.

His brow creases in sleepy confusion. “What is it?”

"Don't fall asleep just yet," he replies - pleads, really - his smile softened by the strange sweetness of catching Jonas falling asleep so readily. Rupert shimmies a little, settling more comfortably into position; he's fully clothed and his shoes are on and they're on top of the cover with the lights on but, fuck it, he can't be bothered to fix any of that.

"You made me laugh today, do you know that?" He pauses to yawn negligently, stifling it in the crook of his folded arms. "The way you looked at those two sometimes. So affronted by them. It was highly amusing."

His exhaustion can’t be helped. He dies a little every time he turns back the clock, his body rotting by increments until - inevitably - he will be the disfigured creature he can’t avoid becoming.

“They were idiots,” Jonas states plainly, as though there’s no other way anyone else might have received them.

Since Rupert is getting closer, Jonas rolls onto his side, too, to face him. He frowns at the state of him, busted and bruised, probably even worse off than can be seen on the surface.

“And you’re the one who suffered for it. It isn’t fair.”

"Who's suffering? I thought it was good fun." Rupert grins, his lips darkened by blood or red wine or both. He's hurting from head to toe, there are dark patches already beginning to colour the skin beneath both eyes, and Rupert is discovering more cuts and bruises every time he moves. And yet he's positive this isn't suffering. This is just the hangover of an accidental adventure.

"I'll feel it in the morning, I suppose, but I'm not dead," He continues. Being so close to Jonas now Rupert barely needs to raise his voice above a murmur. "It's a shame to lose the car, but if you're going to go then you might as well go in style..."

And then, before Jonas can say as much, Rupert says for him:

"You think I'm mad, I'm sure."

"Maybe."

For a seasoned adventurer, Jonas isn't actually very adventurous. He's not a coward, but getting into a car accident is far from his idea of a good time. In his opinion, this is the best part of the day: the two of them mildly drunk and safe inside and comfortable in bed.

"But I'd be a hypocrite to judge you for it. I'm certified crazy."

"Are you? I suppose it's understandable, considering your rather crazy life so far," Rupert points out. He unfolds a hand from under his head and reaches out to lift aside the collar of Jonas's shirt, nudging aside the scarf, revealing the unhappy scars around his neck. A testament to at least one very good reason why nobody could blame Jonas for being a little bit insane.

"Things haven't exactly been easy for you." There's no pity in his voice, no sentimentality, but Rupert's expression softens sadly as he inspects the scarred skin. "Perhaps a little insanity is called for."

Jonas holds still as Rupert reaches out for him, though he's surprised by the contact. The strange tenderness of it. It's not that he's come to expect anything less from Rupert, but in general, it's been a long time since anyone has handled him gently - or at all.

"I was insane before this happened to me," he clarifies. "They called it brief reactive psychosis, but it hasn't been very brief, in my opinion."

If his therapist were still alive, he'd probably suggest Jonas has slid well into schizophrenic territory by now.

"...I hope that doesn't make you second-guess asking me to stay. I've never hurt anyone."

Rupert, who has made a habit of inviting violent and professional murderers into his bed, smiles benignly at Jonas's reassurance. There's an honest, earnest sweetness to that I've never hurt anyone that Rupert knows is so rare, so precious, compared to most of the men and women he's invited to bed over the past six years. And hell, even Rupert has duelled to the death, never his death, often with a laugh and a sneer. A sport, really, when one doesn't care about one's own honour. Perhaps it's Jonas who should be second-guessing who he's staying with.

His fingers pause, falling still against Jonas's collar close enough to feel his pulse, as Rupert stares contemplatively at the boy lying next to him.

"What was it like? Psychosis."

The past tense isn't quite accurate here.

"I see things," Jonas replies. "They're not real. I figure that out later. When it's happening, though, I can't tell the difference. It feels very real when it's happening. Like a nightmare, but I'm awake."

Which makes it so much worse than a nightmare, really. There's no safety promised in waking if waking isn't an option.

"So I panic."

"What do you see?"

It's morbidly fascinating for Rupert, who has to place so much trust in his physical senses. The edge of a blade, the angle of a pistol, the particular flex of a horse's muscle beneath his own. Uncertainty in his old life would have had deadly consequences, daily. Rupert would probably rather be dead. He shakes his head fractionally as he realises that a better question would be:

"How do you cope?"

Jonas scoffs wryly, "Not very well, wouldn't you say?"

He's not sure what it is about him that seems to have attracted Rupert's attention, but he does know that his charms are far from universal. At home, he was broken. At school, a freak. An outcast in 1921. An outlaw in 2052. Being an imPort is the closest he's gotten to fitting in since his father's suicide, and that's only because he's one weirdo out of a hundred weirdos. He hasn't managed to fit himself into the neurotypical mold. The evidence shows that he never will.

"Until recently, I had maps. Schedules. Places to be when I needed to be there. Things I was meant to do. But this world wasn't part of any plan, which has been hard. I can't count how many times I've tried to kill myself here."

"But death doesn't take hold in this world, surely you know that," Rupert whispers with a frown of reproach. "Death is no escape here."

It shouldn't be an escape anywhere, not that he'll say that out loud. Not right now.

"It doesn't take hold in any world, for me."

The most obvious evidence of that being the mark left by a noose that will always fail to kill Jonas.

"You could put a gun to my head right now, pull the trigger, and nothing would happen. But the only time I feel hope is in the second before the trigger fails. There's a little space in the second where I can't help but feel something might go different this time."

For a wild, awful moment Rupert wants to say show me, as if Jonas could (or even would) perform some great example of attempted suicide right here in his bed. But the moment passes and he realises that he doesn't need to see it to believe it - it happened today, in front of his very eyes.

"Like with the car," He says slowly. "You were unharmed. Even my terrible driving couldn't kill you."

It must be awful, feeling that desperate longing for death. Rupert loves danger, he feeds off it like an addict in search of an ever-increasing dizzying high, but he doesn't particularly want to die. There's still too much to experience, too much to enjoy. He chews his lip, sucking it between his teeth in thought, before asking:

"What would help? Don't say 'nothing'..."

But nothing can help. When Jonas knows the only experiences ahead of him are horrors, how can he enjoy anything? Forget about the thrill of danger. Until something finally manages to kill him, the only danger in his life is the danger he poses to others. And there's no thrill in that.

"I'm sorry," he sighs. "I didn't mean to make you feel like you have to do something. I think you were hurt today because I couldn't be. I'm the one who should be helping you feel better."

"No," Rupert insists firmly with a sharp, sudden frown. The hand still resting gently between them moves, sliding to cup Jonas's cheek as if that solid touch could communicate just how much Rupert rejects that idea.

"You have enough to beat yourself up over, please don't add more to the pile. I was hurt today because I was driving like a fool and another fool saw fit to throw a man in front of me. Unless your superpower is a terrible taste in friends I'm afraid you had painfully little to do with it, Jonas."

Jonas nearly argues. He opens his mouth, preparing to launch into detailed explanation of probability and how the likelihood of injury doubles whenever someone is near him. It's a matter of mathematics, not blame. He doesn't need to be reassured. He needs to be avoided.

The argument slides right out of his brain, however, as he registers the hand resting against his cheek. Sucking in a shaky breath, he shuts his eyes and leans into that touch. The underlying panic that had been building now dissipates. His mind goes quiet.

Rupert is used to his touch having a marked effect on people, albeit not quite like this. As a rule, people like it when he touches them. And generally, he too responds just as readily, just as eagerly; hungrily seeking that silent response of thank you, yes, more. It's a common trade, a language that Rupert speaks intimately - that of touch and reaction, for better or worse (and nearly always for the better).

This isn't quite like that, but it's the same thing in its bare bones. The sudden quiet that leaves Rupert breathless in case he might shatter it. The fractional lean into his hand that Rupert can only interpret as a silent request for more. Rupert quietly marvels at the broken yearning in Jonas's expression, sliding a thumb smoothly over his temple. Pushing his fingers through that blond hair. He's an expert when it comes to understanding what people want. What they need.

"Does this help?" Rupert murmurs, smiling faintly. "Talk to me, Jonas. Tell me."

Jonas breathes so slowly that he hardly seems to be moving at all. As if he, too, is afraid of shattering something. Even with Rupert only further encouraged, his caress assured, it feels like something will interrupt this. Something always does.

His lips part a moment or two before they actually form words.

"It's been a long time."

And the last two people who touched him were dead within the hour. Maybe he should warn Rupert. Maybe he will, in a couple minutes. He just wants a few more seconds of contact.

Eyes lidded in heavy amusement, Rupert continues to gently thread his fingers through Jonas's hair. Reassuring, comforting. Enjoying the gentle agony of whatever's taking place inside Jonas's head.

"Ah. Your area of expertise, is it not?" He points out in a murmur. "Time."

"That's a little generous," Jonas protests. He's not an expert in it. He's a slave to it.

What's Rupert doing, though? The longer this goes on, the less Jonas understands it. This is too intimate a touch for near-strangers. Rupert hardly knows him, has no right to care for him as much as he seems to. Jonas doesn't know what to make of it, or what to make of Rupert's expression, the look in his eyes as they watch him.

The uncertainty isn't enough to make him withdraw, though. He'll take as much affection as Rupert cares to give him, however inexplicable it may be.

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