Author's Note: Inspired both by a deviantART image ("Sketchez: BM_smk" by Creature13) and my friend Vivi: "I imagine Mihai and Badou in a very 'I'm totally comfortable being naked around you, but in a nonsexual way with no erections' way." I claim no ownership over DOGS: Bullets & Carnage, and am not profitting from the use of the characters herein.
It's two a.m. and Badou's drunk, a little on leftover adrenaline—still running through his veins after their last hurrah of a gunfight—but mostly on alcohol. Mihai does nothing to stop it; after all, Badou is a big boy. He can take care of himself.
"Hooooly shit, it's a goddamn long way down. Hey, check it out, old man! Betcha I'd splatter pretty far."
Well, maybe not.
They're on the balcony, and Badou's naked, clothes deemed unsalvageable and discarded to the side. He's also bandaged, on his arm and on his side where Mihai shot him, just below his ribs; the wound is small, but magnified in Badou's movements, in the hesitance when he moves his right arm and the way he leans his weight on the railing. Mihai is uninjured, though bloody; he, too, discards his shirt, tossing into the same pile with Badou's garments, destined to be incinerated.
"You're drunk," Mihai observes, coming up behind Badou and resting on hand on the rail. He leans on it, looks out over the city—a blanket of lights and the deceptively beautiful glow of the looters' fires. The city is warring; at a momentary lull, but warring nonetheless, and there are corpses in those streets. Mihai wishes he were drunk, too.
"Yep," Badou agrees, running a hand through his hair, pushing the long strands back out of his face (and Mihai notices, though he's not sure why—Badou's hair, one beautiful, is matted and caked with blood and grime. Oh, the casualties of this war). "Better'n the alternative."
"Sobriety?" Mihai offers a small, wry smile. "You may be right."
"I know I'm right." Badou leans out again, steps up on the lower part of the rail and hangs his upper body off the edge of the building. Mihai sees him wince; alcohol may dull the pain, but it cannot erase it.
They're silent for a moment, just watching. Mihai knows that Badou sees the city differently; where Mihai sees a battle zone, Badou sees a living, breathing entity, the same that swallowed his brother so many years ago. Badou sees a pit of secrets and deceit, roiling, seething masses of darkness and despair, wriggling like maggots in the dark corners of buildings and alleys.
He's so young, to be so cynical.
"You'll need to wash your hair," Mihai observes, reaching out to touch one of the caked, stiff clumps.
Badou shakes his head—not a sign of dissent, but of irritation. "I know." He doesn't sound so drunk, anymore. Amazing what a little despondency can do for the metabolism.
This is what Mihai understands about Badou: That he is a question mark. For all that he is clumsy and gangly and egregious in his vitality, there are parts of Badou that are dark, silent, sullen; Mihai wonders if maybe those are the places inside him where Badou would withdraw, the places where he might self-destruct if no one reaches in to pull him out.
And that's Heine, isn't it? Heine, who has so little patience for stupidity in others and even less patience for stupidity in himself; Heine, who gives Badou no quarter, makes him reach and reach and grasp and always search. They're not friends, not really—even Mihai can see that—but they work well together. Mihai wonders if Badou can see it, the way that Heine gives him an anchor, a lever and a place to stand so Badou can move the world.
"Ah, shit," Badou says, and offers no explanation.
"Indeed," Mihai agrees, and lights a cigarette. In the momentary matchstick glow, he can see Badou watching him, visible eye dark and full of some emotion Mihai can't place.
"Got another?"
"Of course."
Badou lights up, and Mihai thinks: They are at war. The city is tearing itself apart, wild dogs running rampant through alleyways and dark corridors. They are self-immolating, fires raging, spreading and receding rooftop to rooftop; there are bodies in the streets, long-dead, fingers cold and stiff on the stone. And here he and Badou stand, on a rooftop miles away, smoking cigarettes as their world falls apart.
And yet somehow, Mihai thinks, this is not the end. They are nothing if not fighters. This is just a momentary respite, a breather; he knows that by sunrise, he and Badou both will be re-clothed, fire in their eyes and determination in their hearts. It comes with the territory.
"Better get more clothes," Badou says, like he can read Mihai's thoughts.
"That would be wise." Unless they plan to go to battle naked—what a foolish choice that would be. "After we finish these, then."
In the cherry-orange glow from the tip of Badou's cigarette, Mihai sees him crack a smile. "It can wait a little longer," he says, and Mihai nods. "Just until I've had my smoke."