Strata's Fear

Chapter 1

Rowan groaned. "But it's not fair! I don't want to babysit! It's Friday night. I wanna go out!" he whined.

"Sorry, dude. The rest of us already have plans."

"Well, why don't one of you take him with you?"

"You know that's not possible, Rowan. It's too late to get another ticket, and we can't let him out of the house for fear the Dynasty will find him again. You know that."

Rowan harrumphed and crossed his arms. "Fine. Fine! You guys go and have a great time while old Rowan here gets to take care of a four hundred-year old stick in the mud!"

"Sage, maybe we oughta just forget about the opera tonight…" Cye suggested, his lower lip quivering.

"Are you sure? You've been wanting to see La Boheme for years now."

Cye sniffled and nodded.

One pale violet eye glared at the blue-haired archer. "Well, I sure hope you're happy now, Rowan."

A few hours later, Rowan sat on the couch grumbling to himself. The others had gone - Ryo and Kento to the World Wrestling Federation match, Sage and Cye to the opera - while he got stuck with the newly reformed Warlord of Cruelty. Cye's little pout had worked. It always worked on Rowan. It was incredibly hard to be mean to the fish boy. He could cry at the drop of a hat, and that petite little mouth of his could pull off a mean pout. Kento had thrown some money at Rowan on his way out and suggested the archer order a pizza, while at the same time winking and telling him there was some beer in the fridge in the basement.

Sage had felt a little guilty, too. He promised that he and Cye would be home right after the opera ended. Yeah, right. The blonde had wanted to get the Englishman alone for some time now. Rowan didn't expect them to come home at all tonight, much less early. And he honestly didn't want Kento and Ryo to come home either. After the two of them went to one of these matches or a monster truck rally, there was no getting any sleep. The two of them would be at it all night long, their adrenaline pumping so hard they couldn't sleep if they wanted to. Of course on nights like that Rowan couldn't either. His bed was next to the wall that their rooms shared, and he could hear their headboard pounding the wall on the other side. Sage always slept through it all.

Rowan'd just spent several minutes explaining to the ex-warlord all about the plumbing in the bathroom. Now Anubis was taking a plumbing-assisted shower for the first time and seemed to be enjoying himself, because he'd been in there for thirty minutes. At first, Rowan had dreaded showing or teaching the redhead anything, but Anubis caught on quickly and Rowan didn't have to repeat himself, which made things go a lot faster.

"Maybe I oughta order a pizza. Wonder what kind an ex-Dynasty warlord would like." Rowan grabbed the phone book and ordered a couple of large pepperoni pizzas, reasoning that everyone liked pepperoni. After that, everything else was easy. He ran to the basement, grabbed the beer out of the fridge, and ran back upstairs. He set up the gaming console and picked out a couple of movies from his personal stock. "Might as well make a night of it. Just hope old Red can keep up." Rowan popped the top on a can of beer and plopped down in front of the TV. "Now for a little 'Spice'." He grinned when he saw the blue parental lock-out screen just begging for a password. It hadn't taken him long to figure out what it was - good old Grandpa Koji's birthday. He punched in the numbers and instantly the screen was inundated with healthy young women. "Now, that's more like it…" Rowan took a swig of the beer and settled into the couch.

"What is that?"

Rowan bolted upright and automatically his hand hit the channel up-button on the remote. The young naked women were replaced by a haze of static.

"Where did they go, Rowan of the Strata?" Anubis gestured to the television set.

Rowan's mouth hung open. Anubis was wearing a pair of Sage's drawstring khakis and no shirt. Waves of crimson hair blanketed his shoulders. The former warlord's well-toned chest muscles flexed as he bent down and touched the television screen. He jerked back as static electricity jolted through him. "Hn."

Rowan swallowed and grabbed a sofa cushion, shoving it in his lap to cover his obvious erection. "Uh, it's called a television. It's a series of images that are converted to energy and transmitted to this box where it's reconverted to images. Basically."

"So those women weren't real?"

"Well, yeah, somewhere they are, but it's just the pictures that are sent. Not the people themselves."

"Huh. It's amazing how many things I never even knew existed…" Anubis sat down next to Rowan on the couch. "What's that?" He pointed to the beer can in Rowan's hand.

"That's beer. Um, alcohol…fermented beverage?" He passed the can to Anubis who examined it closely and sniffed it. "Try it."

"I drink from this small hole here?"

"Yeah."

Anubis tentatively put the can to his lips and tilted back his head. He downed the contents in one quick gulp. "Hmm. That was good. Is there more?" He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

"Uh, sure." Good god. He drank a half of a can that quick? Rowan pulled another beer out of the cardboard case and tossed it to Anubis.

Anubis looked at it for a moment. "This one doesn't…Oh. I pull this tab?"

"Yeah, sorta. It…" But the redhead had already figured it out and was drinking from the can, gulping down the contents.

Anubis was a god. Anybody that could figure things out that quickly and swallow a full can of beer in less than a minute was Rowan's idol. "Hey, don't ya think ya oughta slow down a little?"

"Slow down?" Anubis crushed the can in his hand.

"Uh, yeah. I ordered a pizza. Wouldn't want all the beer ta run out before it gets here."

"Pizza?"

Rowan sighed. It was going to be a long night.

Rowan soon found out just how quick of a study Anubis was when it came to things electronic. They'd plugged in the N64 and fought several hundred rounds of Mortal Combat 4 - Anubis kicked his ass with every single character including his own favorite, SubZero. He also found out that ex-warlords did like pizza. They finished off the pizza and all of the beer. Now they were lounging on either end of the sofa watching one of Rowan's favorite movies, but he was beginning to think the humor was lost on the warlord. Personally, he had quite a buzz and was thoroughly convinced that this was the funniest movie ever made. A huge monster came out of the wall and proceeded to munch on one of the extras. This sent Rowan into a giggling fit, and he started rolling around on the couch. He wound up pressing his face into the nearest piece of fabric to stifle his laughter. A nice musk scent assaulted his nose, and he stopped laughing long enough to breathe in the rich aroma. He started giggling again and struggled to sit up. Tears were coming out of his eyes. Then he realized where his head had been - in Anubis' lap. He felt like his face had caught fire as the blush spread across his face. He quickly snapped his attention back to the television set, but not before catching a smirk on the ex-warlord's face. /Oh my god. What did I just do? I'm lucky he's buzzed or I'd be dead right now./ Rowan's attention was glued to the television, but he wasn't watching any of it. He could feel Anubis' eyes burning his skin.

"I'm gonna go get some cookies. Want anything?"

He could hear Anubis clear his throat, but he still didn't look at him. "Yes, I do want something, Rowan of the Strata. You."

Annoyed that the warlord still called him by his armor, Rowan piped up, "The name's just Ro…What?!"

"Juice. You have juice, don't you?"

Rowan's heart thudded faster. "Uh, yeah…" Wrinkling up his nose in confusion, he scurried into the kitchen as fast as his inebriated little feet could take him. He just missed the wicked grin that spread across Anubis' face.

Rowan came back to the living room with a glass of milk, Oreo cookies, and a bottle of juice. To his dismay, Anubis was stretched out on the couch.

"Uh, here." He tossed Anubis the bottle of juice and plopped down in front of the former warlord. Using the sofa as a backrest, he stretched his legs out in front of him - his T-shirt and boxers now seemed horribly inappropriate for the current company. He munched on the cookies, dunking them in the milk, and tried to ignore the presence behind him.

The big fight scene between the good guys and the bad guys was about to begin, and Rowan found himself dragged back into the movie. He was starting to really get back into it when a voice whispered in his ear, "Can I have a cookie?" He could feel hot breath on his neck and had a hard time swallowing what was left of the cookie in his mouth.

"Sure." He picked up a cookie and held it over his shoulder.

"Could you put it in the milk first?"

"Do you want me to get you some milk? 'Cause I can. It wouldn't be…"

"No. That's okay. I just thought I could have some of yours."

Rowan felt like a heel. "Okay. Sure. Whatever." Normally, he didn't share his Oreos with anyone. He would practically get into fights with Kento over it. But Anubis was a guest. He dipped the cookie into the milk and held it over his shoulder. He could feel the redhead's weight shift on the couch behind him and felt the cookie being taken out of his hand. He settled against the sofa again and contentedly began to munch on the cookies.

"May I have another one?"

Rowan frowned. He only had a couple left. "All right. Here." He dunked the cookie into the milk and held it over his shoulder. This time, a hot moist mouth and sharp teeth closed over his fingers. He tensed up as the mouth started sucking avidly at his fingertips, licking off milk and every last bit of infinitesimally small cookie crumbs.. He bit his lip to stifle a moan. What the hell was Anubis up to? The archer was trembling, his body about to overload from sugar, beer, and the tingling sensation. He froze, his heart pounding.

"Mind if I have the last one?" a voice whispered in his ear, lips brushing his ear lobe. He shivered as his hand mechanically grabbed the last cookie and dunked it in the milk. Time seemed to stand still as he held it over his shoulder. A hand grabbed his wrist, and he panicked briefly -the force reminding him exactly who sat behind him. A warlord whose war cry had left him pissing in his subarmor on more than one occasion. The cookie was taken from his hand before the velvet mouth once again latched onto his fingertips. His eyes fluttered closed, and his lower lip trembled as a hand snaked its way around his body and began to lightly rub his chest. He struggled to breathe. Anubis whispered in his ear, "Do you like this, Rowan?" The archer nodded - his mind barely registering the fact that the ex-warlord had finally called him Rowan.

Teeth nibbled on his earlobe, and he melted. Anubis' tongue traveled down his neck, and he instinctively tilted his neck to let the redhead have easier access to the sensitive skin. He was rewarded with gentle nips and light sucking, which became more and more urgently feverish with every moaned response from the blue-haired archer. The hand on his chest brushed against a hardened, pink nipple, and Rowan hissed.