WHO: Tragos WHEN: Thursday/Friday WHERE: On the way to Hawaii WHAT:Snakes War dogs on a plane WARNINGS: The standard objectification of women, also some wanking.
What does a War Dog do on a thirteen hour flight?
Drink, obviously.
It’s a continuation of the bachelor party and they’re all drinking for free. The War Dogs are rowdy, taking over the front of the plane and leering toward the girls up the back, though not so rowdy and not so leery that anyone has to step in. Aphrodite’s lot call themselves nymphs and they’re all damn fine specimens of the female form. Marcie’s back there with them, though whatever the nymph title means, she hasn’t taken it. Part of Tragos is relieved at this. She should stand apart from them.
He’s also convinced all the nymphs are hookers, too. Proper high class ones, obviously, not like the tattooed girl from the other night, but still, he doesn’t want that for her.
Sleep?
Night falls and the party goes on, though the heavier it falls the quieter things get. Once one of the lieutenants tells the guys around him to shut the fuck up and let him sleep, the quiet spreads slowly. The plane is empty enough (fancy enough?) they’ve all got seats to themselves. Across the aisle Ander stretches out, headphones on and his eyes half shut, though Tragos can see his eye move through his lids anytime someone walks up the aisle.
Tragos doesn’t sleep. Maybe he dozes. It doesn’t seem to do a lot to the passage of time.
Feel trapped.
Feel the walls of the plane closing like vices around his skin. Feel the height from the earth and the distance from space sandwiching him, each slab of too-much-bigness a constant awareness. Drinking shut it up for a while but now he’s just a bit drunk and hyper aware of the utter vulnerability and insignificance of his whole goddamn self.
Course he’s never flown before. Is there any thrill quite like take-off? Being pressed back into his seat by the force of it, watching the ground fall away, feeling the flip of his stomach at the unreality of it, loving every second and trying to keep it from showing on his face.
The caged feeling doesn’t kick in till later, till long after any hope of escape has passed.
Watch movies.
Watch something dark and violent that makes the screen hard to see because the window is open as dawn creeps over the Pacific Ocean. Let the volume pound into his headphones. Let the view of endless ocean pull his eyes away from the screen. Feel a dread creeping sensation that he doesn't understand, doesn’t even consider that other people feel it too, when they look at the ocean. He’s never been to the ocean with anyone who’d ever admit feeling insignificant in the face of enormity.
Wonder?
Wonder at how he got here. He woke up this morning on a futon that smelled of a damp he can't smell because it's the smell of his childhood. He ran the blocks before dawn, knowing he was about to put his body through thirteen hours of sedentary boredom. Ran hard over cracked pavement, leaped wide over stinking, still stretches of water that never drained. Climbed on top of an abandoned school bus, creaking under the strain his weight put on the rust, and looked over his first domain. Wild weeds, as high as the bus windows, cars and junk and trash among the rushes. Bent fences and slanted roofs and a bunch of birds he never learned the name of. An overgrown but still kinda tended 9/11 memorial, with a hand painted sign, the wood cracked now. The sign a full three months younger than he was.
From that to a private plane in a matter of hours. Champagne and spirits and luxury. A free hot towel Tragos doesn’t know what to do with, and a selection of chocolates he does. None of the chocolates quite melt in his mouth the way the things Marcie bought back from the masked party do, but they’re still nicer than he’d ever thought possible. There's a cart up the front they can help themselves to but all the guys are using the call bell so the air hostess brings them things personally.
Yeah, life's pretty fucking good right now.
Worry?
Yeah, a bit. Kaden’s at home with Barak and Cy for ten days. Aside from two months in juvie when he was fourteen, Tragos has never left home for this long before. At least Barak’s in a better mood that he was at the start of the week. Tragos hasn’t seen him that feral and violent for a long time, and he’s seen him fighting in the ring.
Still, Kaden’s not an idiot. He knows not to provoke anything and he’s got enough friends he can hang with instead of being at home. Tragos left him a wad of cash, he can make himself popular with his mates by buying in the booze or something - Kaden’s got a fake ID for that kind of thing, same as Tragos. Legal drinking still feels like a lifetime away.
And finally, fantasize about fucking Marcie.
No question about it, this is the one he keeps coming back to.
There’s no chance of sneaking into the bathroom with her, every single person on this plane would know, and Ares is already in a dangerous mood. He’d love it though, fucking her in there, hand pressed over her mouth to keep her quiet.
This is a bad pastime, he’s already uncomfortably turned on. He gets up to go to the bathroom, and meets her eye across the seats. Its enough to make his heart throb in his groin. Jerking off in the bathroom isn’t as satisfying but his memories and fantasies of her are so vivid it’s still better than a normal wank.
Still, they’ll be on an island together for the next several days, and Tragos is determined to make something else happen there.