Chapter 9 of THE KINGDOM
Sunday, August 25th, 2013 01:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nannyn posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
mindcrackloveIt's like three hours after my last post. Yes, Kappa, I wasn't lying. I really have nothing to do. WHATSOEVER.
Here's the normal: I can't link pretty, read previous chapters, comment below for motivation, blah blah blah.
Story time!
-Beef-
“Pause. Please answer me.”
“No! I’m waiting for the first chance I can get to get out of this place and back up to my room, so I don’t have to look at any of your godsdamn faces anymore.”
Beef leaned back, sighing. “Then I can’t do anything to help you.”
Pause snorted. “I didn’t want your help in the first place.”
Guude was still standing up, watching the whole scene unfold. The guests had gotten their desserts if they wished for them, and were eating happily while chatting to their table neighbors. The others had moved out onto the empty floor space and were currently dancing to the music from the band playing in the corner.
Beef wanted to dance at some point during the night. He just had to wait for—
“Hello everyone!”
Beef blinked out of his thoughts to see Kurt standing behind his chair, greeting everyone. Six out of nine people greeted him fully, asking how he was doing, how his family’s business was holding up and things of that nature. Pause was the only one who grunted a brief “Hello,” before returning to wallow in his terrible mood.
Zisteau and Etho eventually got past the six and introduced themselves.
Kurt greeted them with a grin. “I’m Beef’s lover.”
Zisteau stopped short. “Ah—”
Nebris stifled a snort, while Anders cracked up with Guude. Beef blushed, grinning.
Etho shook Kurt’s hand. “It’s very nice to meet you, Kurt.”
Beef went up to Kurt and kissed him.
Kurt pulled out of the kiss and said, “Hello to you too.”
“Kurt, where were you?” Beef asked.
Kurt replied with, “I’m sitting with my family on the right-side table.”
Guude joined in on the conversation, clapping a hand on Kurt’s shoulder. “We could’ve moved your family up here with us. It would’ve been more comfortable for you, at least.”
Kurt smiled thankfully. “Thank you for the offer. Surprisingly, I rather enjoyed chatting with the other shop-owners around us. It was a good way to catch up with what was going on in the city outside our immediate vicinity.”
Guude nodded, understanding. The he pushed the two around the table and towards the dance floor. “Go do some dancing, you two! The music is dead, and we need someone to liven it up again!”
Beef grinned and wrapped his arm around Kurt. “Want to go dance?”
Kurt grinned. “Let’s go kill it with our smooth moves.”
Beef laughed, hooking Kurt with his left arm, holding his hand with his right, and swinging him onto the dance floor.
-Nebris-
Nebris watched Kurt and Beef move gracefully through the masses. They were like a well-oiled machine. All the right steps, all the right swoops and twirls. They were all perfected. Some people even stopped to watch them.
The band had noticed their dancing and had been revived, and the music was as good as ever.
Nebris made note of Beef’s wonderful dancing skills. Nebris knew that it was because he was one of the Brothers, of a high class. Every person of high class was expected to know how to dance perfectly and elegantly. But even then, not everyone was a good dancer, even though they knew the steps. But Beef was a natural.
The interesting and impressive thing was that Kurt, being of a lower class, would know how to dance so beautifully and as elegantly as the people of higher class than him. Beef, a few months earlier, had personally hired a ballroom teacher for the very purpose of teaching Kurt how to professionally dance. They practiced whenever they could, which meant that when Nebris was visiting the castle from his estate in northern Mindcrackia, he would often see Beef and Kurt twirling through the halls.
As Nebris watched them dance, he knew that the lessons had paid off. Kurt and Beef were the best dancers out there.
Of course, they were the only people of a high class, so they were probably the only ones with professional training. He loved dancing, and would gladly join them on the dance floor. Nebris himself was not spared from the tradition, and so he was taught ballroom dancing by a professional. And even though it never was mentioned, he was pretty good at it, too. If only he had someone to dance with that was at his level of skill.
And like it was a wish that had been granted, someone cleared their throat behind him. He turned around to see Etho standing there, looking slightly embarrassed.
“Yes?” Nebris asked.
“I would like to know if I could have this dance.” Etho said, bowing and holding out his hand for Nebris to take.
Nebris smiled. “I would love to.”
-Kurt-
Beef whirled him about once again, and Kurt had never felt so alive.
His face was probably flushed from dancing. Beef’s definitely was, either from the dancing or the mead. Maybe it was because of the level of contact it required to dance with someone. If that was the case, Kurt adored the pink flush on Beef’s face, because it was just too cute.
The fast-paced song winded down to a slower one, one where they could still dance, but it would be easier to talk to each other while doing so.
Kurt grinned, knowing that it was his time to ask. “Beef, your face is a bit red. Would you like to sit down for a bit?”
Beef’s face grew even redder at the mention, and Kurt rejoiced on the inside, all the while retaining a mildly concerned air.
“No, I’m fine. It’s from the mead I drank, I guess.” Beef said
Kurt nodded, knowing that it was what it probably was.
“Oh, look at that.” Beef remarked, grinning.
“What?” Kurt asked.
“Oh, oops.” Beef said, spinning them around so Kurt could look at what he was so interested about.
“Is that…” Kurt asked.
“Nebris and Etho, dancing together?” Beef asked, smiling. “Why, yes it is.”
Kurt sighed happily. “They’d be good together.”
Beef smiled warmly and nodded. “They would.”
Kurt continued to watch them. “They certainly dance well together.” He commented.
They certainly did. They moved fluidly, like they could read each-other’s minds, and know where they were putting their feet and coordinate from there.
“They rival us.” Beef commented airily, then said, equally airily, “We should have a dancing duel.”
Kurt smiled. “We would need more competitors to make it appropriate.”
“Well, look who’s joining us!” Beef said, and spun Kurt around so he could see. And just like that, Vechs and Zisteau had joined the mass on the dance floor, soon followed by very, very drunk Guude and Anders, who could barely stand upright.
“That’s enough for a dance-off.” Beef said.
Kurt grinned.
“Let’s do it.”
-Zisteau-
He had been watching Vechs all night.
Zisteau didn’t know what it was. Maybe it was the way the light reflected off the goggles perched on his head. Or maybe it was the slim fingers in the black gloves. Or maybe it was the casual, yet unbelievably seducing walk.
It was walk that got him. Definitely the walk.
And when the one that we was studying from afar all night walked up to him and asked him to dance, he couldn’t say no.
He led Vechs out onto the dance floor and they started to dance. Round and round the dance floor they went, swinging each other until they were breathless.
Vechs, after a while, finally said, “Oof, let’s slow down a bit.”
Zisteau slowed down considerably after that. He was disappointed, though; they had almost achieved the speed that the dances of his land were normally set at.
He was about to talk about it, but was interrupted by a voice calling out.
“Ladies and gentleman, please take your seats. You eight, stay.”
The rest of the crowd filed back to their seats, murmuring about what was going on. When they were all situated, Doc—the person who called out—clapped his hands for silence.
No one dared to mess with Doc, and they fell silent immediately. The heads turned. Zisteau saw that Doc was standing on Guude’s chair so he could be seen by everyone.
“Hey! Get off my chair!” Guude yelled from the dance floor.
Doc crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.
Guude gave Doc a withering look. “Fine. Do what you want.”
“We now have permission to do whatever we want from the king, people! Go crazy!” Anders yelled out, only to be hushed by Beef, who was laughing.
Doc clapped his hands again, and they fell silent.
“We are gathered here today at this feast to celebrate three countries joining together to reinvigorate our centuries-old alliance.” He started.
Vechs snorted. “And to discuss money.” He said quietly. Zisteau bit lip lip so he wouldn’t laugh.
Doc continued. “And what better way to strengthen our relationship than having an all-out war between them, in the form of a dance-off?”
The crowd laughed and began to clap.
Doc threw up his hands. “Now, who wants to see this happen?”
The crowd started cheering.
“Good! Now wait for a bit, and we’ll get it set up for you!” Doc finished, and stepped off Guude’s chair.
Zisteau turned to Vechs. “Well, I guess that ends our dancing for tonight.”
Vechs smiled darkly. “No it won’t. I’ll see you after the party ends.”
And with that, he turned on his heel and walked off. Zisteau stared after him.
Why did he have to walk like that? It was very distracting.
-Vechs-
He really wanted to turn around to see Zisteau’s face. He knew it would be a bad idea, and he had to resist it.
So to satisfy his need, he just added a little more swing to his hips as he walked back to the group of people from his country.
As he approached, he noticed the people who were working—and the people who weren’t. Those people were Guude and Anders.
“Okay, you two, go away.” He told them, pushing them back to their seats. They just walked back and sat down, giggling to each other.
Vechs rubbed his temples. They really do turn into three-year-olds when they get super drunk. He thought, then turned to the situation at hand.
“What’s the game plan?” he asked Nebris, who seemed like the one who was organizing the whole thing.
“Beef and Kurt are going to be the ones dancing.” Nebris said.
Vechs nodded. “Sounds good to me.”
“And…” Nebris produced sheet music from his bag that he had brought from his rooms. “…Is what they’re going to dance to.”
Vechs looked at the paper, and when he saw the title of the piece, he started to giggle. “That song? Why that one?”
“It’s the one song in all of the songs in the whole kingdom that Guude likes, apparently.” Beef said. “It’s all he asks for whenever we’re walking around and a band asks to play for us.”
Kurt looked at the notes on the notesheets. “Well, it is a very good song. It’s fun to dance to, also.”
“It definitely is. It’s a classic.” Vechs said, rubbing his hands together.
Nebris noticed “What’re you doing with your hands?”
Vechs looked down at them. “Oh. I don’t know.”
“Well, Etho and Zisteau better hope that they have good songs, because when the crowd hears this, they’re going to go wild.” Beef said.
Doc came over. “Are you guys ready?”
The four nodded.
“Good, because this is going to get interesting.”
Character. Now. Comment so I don't lose my mind.
Previously:
Prompt: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2611
Chapter 1: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2634
Chapter 2: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2653
Chapter 3: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2688
Chapter 4: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2698
Chapter 5: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2729
Chapter 6: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2755
Chapter 7: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/2781
Chapter 8: http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/280221.html#cutid1
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Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 06:18 am (UTC)For whatever reason, I automatically assumed the song would be Gangnam Style. Mostly because it made me laugh really, really hard.
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Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 03:00 pm (UTC)And no, the song isn't Gangnam style. I've heard it in several commercials here in the U.S, But I don't know if other countries are as familiar with the tune as we are. But whatever the reason, it'll probably make you dance in you chair, or at least bop your head or foot to the beat.
(Don't tell anyone, but here's a hint: it's electroswing music.... :D)
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Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 06:54 am (UTC)YAY! I NEED TO SLEEP NOW!
STILL KURT! :D
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Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 02:55 pm (UTC)Glad you like it!
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Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 07:23 am (UTC)Really great, keep on!
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Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 02:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 03:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 08:53 pm (UTC)And you don't mess with Doc. If you do... bad things will happen. Thankfully, Guude knows that full and well.
NEBRETHO! *squee*
I'm sad that no one said anything about vechs :"(
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Date: Monday, August 26th, 2013 01:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, August 25th, 2013 10:54 pm (UTC)(don't ever stop <3)
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Date: Monday, August 26th, 2013 12:05 am (UTC)Thank you! *MWAH* :D