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Nick is staring at him. Again.
“Dude, what? Do I have something on my face?” Static Man asks, rubbing his cheek and then getting distracted because he’s touching his own skin. His own face! He has a face now!
“What--no,” Nick says, looking away. The tip of his ears go red and Static Man watches in fascination. He’s seen Nick blush before, of course, he’s basically been living with him for three years now, but everything has been sort of hazy, even his eyesight, and now he can see in detail that he hasn’t in ages.
It’s like getting glasses for the first time and realizing all the details you were missing, the separate leaves on trees, the individual blades of grass when he walks down to Prospect Park on his own, not needing to be recorded.
He’s not quite...human-looking. Human enough to pass, definitely, especially if he keeps his mouth shut. But his canine teeth are sharp, a leftover from his staticky being, and his eyes are too bright, like lightning is trapped inside of them. And he shocks everyone he touches, a low-level thing that eases but never quite goes away.
But he has a body! A home-grown, all-his-own body courtesy of Morgan.
“Nick, seriously, what were you looking at?” Static Man asks and Nick scrunches his nose a little at being called Nick, as always. It makes Static Man grin.
“Your hair is glowing a little,” Nick finally says and Static Man goes still when Nick reaches out, twirling a strand of it around his finger. Nick’s hair is dark but Static Man’s is darker, black in a way that looks blue, and right now even bluer, like there’s a thread of electricity running through it.
“That doesn’t shock you?” Static Man asks and Nick gives him a faint smile, almost amused.
“It’s nothing compared to how you were,” he says, tugging on the strand of his hair before letting go, sending a shock of something through Static Man’s body. He shivers before he can stop himself and Nick raises an eyebrow.
“Arthur?” he asks and Static Man huffs, shaking his head.
“Fine. ‘M fine.”
Nick watches him with those dark, piercing eyes and Static Man stares back, swallowing a little, throat dry.
“Nick...?”
“I was wondering something,” Nick's voice is soft. “It’s been...a week, since you’ve gotten the body, hasn’t it? How does it feel?”
“Good,” Static Man says, eyes widening as Nick keeps looking at him. “It’s...fine, really.”
“Anything giving you trouble? Maybe Morgan can help.” Nick sweeps his eyes down Static Man’s body in a way that makes his skin prickle.
“What are you asking me, dude?” Static Man asks, a little breathless. “Are you wondering if my dick works?”
Nick’s cheeks flush but he keeps his gaze and voice steady. “Sure, if that’s what’s bothering you.”
“Well, it works,” he snaps, testy. “I piss just fine.”
Nick’s lips thin. “And other things?” he asks clinically, because Nick is the least delicate person alive.
“Jesus, dude,” he says, but he can feel his cheeks heat mortifyingly.
“What?” Nick looks testy. “It’s a genuine question.”
“You want to know if I--”
“--You were always talking about it!” Nick says. “And every time we--” He breaks off, blushing hard and Static Man remembers--
( “Tomorrow,” Static Man says excitedly and Nick smiles at him indulgently, his hair doing that thing where it flops in front of his eyes.
“Yeah,” he says, watching as Static Man eviscerates the fried chicken breast in the vague approximation of his staticky hands. “Are you nervous?”
“A little, I mean. Morgan won’t even let me look at it.” He knows he sounds whiny.
“She said it’ll adapt to you when your...soul is inside of it. It’s like a mold.”
“If it isn’t jacked, though,” Static Man says and Nick snorts.
“I’m not sure it’ll look like Tom Hardy, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
“He’s not your type anyway,” Static Man says and Nick goes red, which makes him grin.
“I--that is--”
Static Man leans forward, Pop-Eye’s forgotten on the floor beneath them and Nick’s breath hitches.
“One last round? For good luck?” he says and Nick tips his head up, breath coming out shakily. “Next time, I’ll have real hands.”
Nick laughs breathlessly, and Static Man closes the distance between them, the heat of Nick’s blood calling to him, a siren song he can rarely ever resist.)
“I haven’t tried it,” Static Man blurts out and Nick looks startled, his cheeks still pink.
“But you were...”
“I know...I just.” Static Man looks down, at the hands that are his own, wide and uncalloused and soft. “It’s too much.”
“Too much?”
“Don’t act like you haven’t noticed,” he says lowly. “Every time you touch me I freeze up. I feel it too much.”
Nick’s eyes are wide, his pupils dilated, and Static Man swallows.
“Nick--what--”
“Can we try? I want to, that is, if you want--”
“Yeah, yes. Um.” Static Man can feel himself blushing to match Nick and Nick’s eyes gleam, dark and possessive.
Nick gets up, gripping his cane, and he jerks his head in that prissy, authoritative way he usually only gets when he’s working on rituals and magic, and Static Man finds himself following like he always does, and he may not be Nick’s vassal anymore but those habits are hard to break.
“You’ve gone out, haven’t you?” Nick says when they get to the bedroom, thrumming with energy. “You’ve come back intoxicated before with Morgan.”
“Yeah,” Static Man snorts. “I’ve gotten drunk, which is great, I’d forgotten how fun that is, but, uh. Not. That.” The thought of someone touching him, someone he doesn’t know putting his hands on him sends his brain fizzing out in a panic.
“The teeth are a little hard to explain,” he adds and Nick snorts softly.
“Not in Brooklyn.”
“Okay, yeah, maybe not,” he agrees and then his voice dies on him when Nick reaches up, touching his cheek lightly with his fingers. He shivers hard as Nick trails an index finger along his jaw.
“You are sensitive,” he breathes, eyes bright and calculating. “What does it feel like?”
“Like...like...” He gets distracted when Nick’s hand rests on his neck, his thumb stroking down the curve of his throat. He tips his chin up, breath catching.
“Like what?” Nick asks, pausing, and Static Man makes a soft noise, closing his eyes tightly.
“It feels like I’m being electrocuted,” he says, breath hitching when Nick’s thumb starts to move again. “It’s like...” He makes a sound that’s perilously close to a whine, heat crackling up his spine. “Is this what you felt like, when I touched you, before?”
“Probably,” Nick says softly. “Felt like I was burning up alive, and I couldn’t get enough.”
“D’you miss it?” Static Man asks, pressing into his touch with a shudder.
“Oh, I think I’ll manage just fine,” Nick murmurs, then kisses him. Static Man makes a low, ruined noise against his mouth, back arching like he isn’t sure whether to move closer or pull away. It’s too much, Nick’s soft, chapped lips against his own, his tongue teasing the inside of his mouth, dragging along the sharp canines of his teeth. Nick’s hands are on his sides, pushing his shirt up and the feel of his hands on his skin make Static Man jerk, something like static sizzling along his spine.
When Nick pulls away for them both to breathe, his eyes look dark and predatory, a drop of blood on his lips from the sharpness of Static Man’s teeth. Static Man can’t look away from it, can still remember how it felt to smell Nick’s blood, how distracting it always was, how much he’d always wanted to sink his teeth into the skin of his neck.
He leans forward and licks at his lower lip, tasting the copper of his blood, and Nick drags his nails lightly down Static Man’s sides, making him gasp.
“Nick,” he says and Nick grins against his mouth.
“I want to do so much to you,” he says and Static Man makes a sound that's half a laugh, half a moan, cheeks flushing.
“Bossy,” he says and Nick bites lightly at his lower lip, then soothes the sensation with his tongue when Static Man makes a little heated noise.
“You knew that about me already.”
Static Man laughs, and then his breath huffs out of him when Nick pushes him onto the bed.
Nicholas feels wild, out of control. Static Man looks up at him from the bed, his blue-black hair in messy curls, begging to be tugged, his glittering eyes wide and bright. Nick wants to ruin him, the way Static Man ruined him before getting his body, the way those phantom hands gave him pleasure in a way he’d never felt before.
His body is beautiful, of course it is, and Nicholas carefully leans his cane against the wall before getting onto the bed, over him, and he leans down to kiss him again. It’s almost the same, really. Static Man--Arthur. He should get used to Arthur, they both should--but he still shocks him, maybe not to the degree as before, but it’s still there, the static shock that Nicholas’s body has learned to indicate as something good.
Static Man keeps making these noises, overwhelmed little things that make Nicholas want with a sharp intensity. He’s clearly overwhelmed, his chest heaving when Nicholas pulls back to look at him, his skin flushed and eyes wide and
“Are your eyes glowing?” Nicholas says and Static Man licks his lips, shuddering when Nicholas drags his hand down his chest.
“You tell me,” he manages and then bites back a noise when Nick rubs his thumb along his nipple. “Fuck.”
“What did you used to like?” Nicholas asks instead, doing that again just to see Static Man tip his head back and breathe, shuddering.
“I...Fuck, I can’t remember. Everything. It’s all too much. Nick,” he says plaintively and Nicholas can feel the way his lips curl, predatory.
“Yeah?”
“Stop teasing me,” he says raggedly, and Nicholas has to kiss him again, licking into his mouth to chase his moans. Static Man moves under him, touching him like he can’t quite figure out where to go first, like he’s trying to decide whether he wants to arch his hips up or move away.
He can feel the hot line of his cock against Nicholas’s hip and he makes a pleased noise, pressing down, and Static Man jerks, gasping into his mouth.
“Guess that’s working,” Nicholas murmurs and Static Man chokes out a strained laugh.
“Dick,” he says and Nicholas, presses his thigh between his legs.
“Mhm,” he hums, playful, and Static Man shudders, eyes widening.
“Nick,” he says and Nicholas reaches down to squeeze him.
“Nicholas,” he says again, urgently, and Nicholas looks at him, how flushed he is, the crackling of his hair.
“Really?” he says and he scowls at him, the muscles of his stomach clenching when Nicholas pops the button of his pants.
“I haven’t been touched like this in fucking years,” he says testily. “So forgive me if--fuck.”
Nicholas curls his hand around Static Man’s cock and watches with heat when he comes all over himself in two strokes. Nicholas hums and Static Man looks dazed, breathing hard.
“Bet you could get hard again in like a minute,” he says, and Static Man makes a low, wounded noise, eyes widening when Nicholas curiously licks his fingers.
“Kind of like ozone,” he says and Static Man just groans like he’s been shot, reaching up to tiredly curl his fingers in Nicholas’s hair. Nicholas leans into the touch, amused.
“That was...”
“Yeah?”
Static Man huffs out a tired laugh and Nicholas turns to press a kiss to his wrist, feeling inordinately affectionate.
"Can I taste you?" he murmurs and Static Man shivers.
"I think I'm at your mercy, aren't I?" he says weakly and Nicholas just slides down, between his legs. He carefully peels Static Man out of his pants, running his hands up his legs just to see him shiver at the touch.
"You can always say no."
"I don't want to," Static Man says and Nicholas's lips curl up at that before he leans down, taking him into his mouth. Static Man's hand tightens in Nicholas's hair and he hisses through his teeth. Static Man is still soft, and the smell of him is half clean, sharp body sweat and that heady taste of ozone curling on his tongue. Nicholas hums and Static Man shudders underneath him, the muscles in his thighs clenching as he hardens inside of his mouth.
"Fuck," he says urgently, and when Nicholas looks up through his lashes, he looks wild-eyed, and Nicholas swears he can see a spark of light glittering through Static Man's curls. His strange, bright eyes glow and Nick shudders, feeling the static shock travel from Static Man's hand in his hair down his own spine and straight to his dick. In his eagerness to touch Static Man, he'd forgotten his own arousal, and he presses his hips down onto the mattress for some relief.
Static Man tugs on his hair when Nicholas swallows around him, and his jaw aches already but it feels good to give this to Static Man, to see him so desperate, to feel the way the lingering static power inside of his body goes haywire and starts shocking Nick again in earnest, sending little thrills of pleasure through his body.
He pulls back slightly so he can press his tongue to the spot just under the head of his cock, and Static Man thrashes, the sheets singed from the surge of electricity that runs through his body.
"I'm, babe, I'm close," he babbles and Nicholas feels that same surge of pleasure at the pet name that he gets from Static Man's little bursts of static shock. Nicholas just hollows his cheeks and sucks harder, until Static Man is keening and coming hard.
Nicholas swallows what he can and pulls back to cough a little, unused to doing that regularly at this point in his life. "Kind of...tingles a little," he rasps and Static Man tugs at his hair, pulling him up to kiss him hard. He makes a surprised noise but he kisses back, shuddering when Static Man's teeth catch on his lower lip, and Static Man's hand drags down his chest, shoving his shirt up so he can touch his skin and Nicholas pants into Static Man's mouth, wriggling helpfully to get his pants down enough that Static Man can get a hand on him.
"I need--" Nicholas makes a frustrated noise, because Static Man's hand is good, so good, but he needs something else, something more, and Static Man huffs out a laugh against his cheek and there's a burst of raw kinetic power that skitters down Static Man's skin to his hand wrapped around him and that's it, Nicholas is gone, and he can hear himself whining softly like a hurt animal, until he slumps on top of him, going boneless.
They're both quiet for a long time, breathing hard and in sync, and then Static Man wipes his hand clean on Nicholas's shirt. Nicholas wrinkles his nose and Static Man uses his clean hand to tug at Nicholas's hair.
"That was pretty kinky, babe," he says and Nicholas turns his head to bite at Static Man's shoulder just to hear the stutter in his breath.
There's another beat of quiet.
"Safe to say that body of yours does work," Nicholas says and Static Man snorts out a laugh, which makes Nicholas grin too, smothering on his shoulder. And then--
"Was I better than that dying god?"
"I told you that wasn't romantic!"