Author's Notes: Just a little something to hopefully brighten the dreary outlook of finals.

There was a moment that I considered writing something in the SBB!verse, and then thought, "Who am I kidding? I'd never pull it off." Canonical details. I have none.

Warnings: Implied yaoi, shounen-ai, etc. Cursing. Pseudo-crack. Un-beta'd.

Pairing(s): You wouldn't be reading this if you didn't already know. Ike/Marth. Maybe. Wait, what?

Disclaimer: I don't own Super Smash Brothers.

Summary: Something was amiss and Roy couldn't quite put his finger on it. Suffice to say, Link and Pit were no help. [One-shot, sword-fighting academy AU] –Implied yaoi, slash: Ike/Marth-

Sword Innuendos

By SSBBSwords

Sword combat was one of those things that was so misinterpreted by modern pop culture, Roy wasn't that embarrassed to admit he used to be one of the oblivious millions.

That being said, once enrolled in the academy, he learned to alter his conceptions of sword-fighting. Despite having to muddle through the tedium of learning theory and history, he still believed the kinesthetic portion of the education was worth the blood, sweat, and tears. Literally.

Sure, he still loved watching the fantastical action-renderings on TV, movies, and video games, but when it personally came down to what he knew? It was a little (okay, a lot) different. Yes, the academy included branches for sport fencing, Asian martial art styles, and historical role-playing societies, but at the end of the day, most beliefs of swordmanship were overly romantic.

But, hey. Roy was a romantic, which would explain how he found himself here.

Believe it or not, Masters of Defense had written hundreds of detailed instructional manuals during the Medieval and Renaissance eras. Let's face it. Swordsmanship was a highly sophisticated combat skill, reserved for duels, street-fights, and battlefield encounters. It was violent and brutal and disturbingly effective in doling out large portions of death.

So color Roy surprised when he met a fellow student named Marth who had a strangely distinctive aristocratic style of dispatching his opponents. Not that students actually were killing each other off. Just watching Marth mimic the motions in practice was enough to send warning bells off in Roy's head to never, ever piss this guy off.

When Roy graduated, he was genuinely surprised to find himself with an opportunity to be an instructor, especially since he felt he had a long way to go before he would ever consider himself an expert or master. He, however, perked up upon hearing Marth would be joining him in the toils of teaching. Somewhere in between all the grueling conditioning, counterstrike-filled spars, and evolution of technique repertoire, they made a fairly strong unspoken friendship pact. It was hard to resist. After all, it was don't-be-on-this-guy's-bad-side at first sight. Fortunately enough, Marth was actually quite nice beneath all that graceful aggression and audacity when fighting.

Years later, Roy felt he was finally settling into his position. Right now though, he was about five minutes away from freedom and about thirty seconds from smacking one of his students for stupidity.

With an unsubtle grumble of annoyance, Roy stepped between two students drilling the latest sequence and instinctively intercepted the first-year's strike. Leveraging his body and unbalancing the young student, Roy scowled down at the now-seated boy on the mat. "What do you think you're swinging? A fucking lightsaber?"

Out of the corner of his eye, he realized another instructor passing by between the office and equipment room. Blond. Oh, he was not going to live that comment down. And true to form, when he met up with the others during dinner, Link grinned at him across a forkful of food and said, "So when were you going to tell us you were defecting to the Jedi Order?"

Roy was on a mission to ask Marth for a favor and was waiting for the elevator to arrive at his floor when the man in question exited. Pausing midway between the elevator doors, Marth greeted, "Hello, Roy," and then realizing he was blocking traffic, he side-stepped to remove himself as the closing doors' obstacle. He kept a hand pressed against the insistent doors. "Were you coming up to see me?"

"Yes…" Roy responded and the rest of his sentence trailed off as he noticed a new face exiting the held elevator doors. Automatically, Roy fell into step with Marth and he wouldn't have thought much of the third person further except the stranger was following Marth, who seemed to be heading toward the training room. "Uh…" Was there a way to ask what this random guy was doing without coming off as rude? It also seemed equally impolite to jump into his planned spiel in hopes of convincing his friend to cover supervising an upcoming night's open practice hours.

So the trio entered the empty training room with a hefty layer of awkward silence, at least in Roy's opinion. Unbeknownst to Roy's internal predicaments, Marth began to point out details of the equipment and adjoining rooms. At one point, Marth had stopped to help two students find the proper cleaning solution for the swords. It was then that the newcomer was closest to Roy and turned to him with an easy smile and hand held out for a handshake. "Hey, I'm Ike."

"Roy," he responded, politely shaking the other's hand, firm but not overly aggressive, "which you probably knew already."

"I'm sorry," Marth apologized as he approached, having left the students to their duties across the room. Upon witnessing their handshake, his eyes widened as realization dawned upon him that he had forgotten introduction. Apologetic, Marth quickly turned to Roy and explained, "Greil's on sabbatical next semester. Ike will be filling in for him."

"Oh, bummer. Bringing that guy in to demo maneuvers was almost as good a scare tactic as bringing in you," Roy muttered, truly disappointed that the older man would not be around for half a year.

Knowing just how much Roy liked to make his students' lives just a bit more difficult, Marth smiled at the underlying compliment and gestured at Roy and himself. "We graduated from this academy together."

"Sure, just give ourselves away," Roy joked. "He'll think this place is run on some variation of nepotism that favors its own graduates." He shot Ike a curious look. "Where'd you train?"

With one corner of his mouth twitching in a valiant attempt to hide a wry smile, Ike informed good-naturedly, "Actually, my father taught me."

Roy considered this and decided, "Yeah? That's cool. Anyone we might have heard of?"

A light cough that sounded suspiciously like a laugh was emitted by Marth, and after the pair exchanged amused looks, Ike answered, "Greil's my dad."

Oh. Roy blinked, feeling rather blindsided. "Shit! I'm so sorry, I didn't mean—" to make a nepotism reference when this was ACTUALLY SORT OF THE CASE?

Ike waved it off with a shrug and returned Roy's casual vernacular with his own, "It's cool. Don't worry about it." The taller man grinned and flawlessly changed the direction of the conversation. "I can't wait to get started."

When he had finally come to terms with his social faux pas, Roy had decided it really wasn't his business to care how Ike's sword-fighting skills were or if the guy was qualified to take over Greil's position, even if just temporarily. If he wanted to play Human Resources Officer, he would have never picked up a sword.

Currently, he was sitting in Pit's office as the petite brunet perused a student's paper on double cross sword advantages and disadvantages. Roy had glanced at the paper's length and level of technical language to which he was unfamiliar and jetted straight out of his office for Pit's. Working two swords at once was one of those electives that he had avoided (and then subsequently regretted when he met Pit for the first time as new staff). This was also what he got for letting his students pick any topic relatable to sword design.

"It's fine," the other instructor reassured, passing the fourteen-paged paper back to Roy, who took it with a grimace. "The student's done her research. It's quite interesting." Translation: You should read it and learn something new.

"Thanks, I—"

At this moment, Link popped his head into the office long enough to say, "You guys should come down and see this." The blond ducked back out of the office in an instant, presumably to swiftly return to wherever he had come from.

"What's going on?" Pit asked rhetorically, eyebrows furrowed quizzically. Roy shrugged, and they both left to trail after their enthused colleague.

The training area was empty, save for Marth and Ike, both with dulled practice swords. Roy was used to seeing one of lighter weight within Marth's hand, and as usual, could not help his eyes gravitating and settling on the other's adept movements. After watching for a brief second, Roy frowned, confused. Marth's movements indicated avoidance. Watching his friend move so defensively as opposed to focused, offensive attacks was strange. Marth was just about as pretty as he was ruthless.

That's when Roy noticed the incoming arc from Ike that Marth was so preoccupied about evading.

"What the…!" Roy exclaimed out loud, the expletive lost in his shock. Link and Pit paid no attention to the outburst, and Roy continued in broken sentences, "Is that… fuck me. Really? Holy mo—"

"I refuse," Link flippantly responded out of habit, but any more clever remarks dissolved into murmurs of general disbelief.

It was one thing for the guy to be swinging the heaviest sword around, but to be doing it one-handed was another story. Maybe even a never-ending story, because Ike didn't seem to even think to bring the damn gigantic thing to a resting position after heaving it around single-handedly. What.

"Someone explain to me how that's possible," Roy asked faintly, wincing as the weighted object nearly collided with his friend's legs. If he were in Marth's position, he would be extremely miserable right now.

Only misery seemed the last thing on Marth's mind, if his facial countenance and body language had any say on the matter. In a matter of minutes, Marth seemed to have grasped Ike's timing and, after one particularly large swing which Marth did not bother countering because his force would never match Ike's, pivoted and swept the other's supporting leg out from underneath him. As the taller man tried to save himself from collapsing face-first onto the mat, Marth pinned Ike's hand and sword to the ground and flipped his own to point down right between Ike's shoulder and chin.

Eyes aglow with excitement, Marth smiled down at Ike. "You're a bit slow."

"Yeah?" Ike lifted himself halfway up with his free hand and knees. "Let's go again."

The nice thing about teaching at the academy was that there was no competition between instructors, as they all had their own weapon-wielding styles and philosophies. However, the even nicer part was that anyone you asked would be willing to go a couple rounds for the sheer fun of it, because they wouldn't be here if they all didn't have a thing for the zone that they entered when fighting.

As of right now, this was about the third time Ike had knocked Roy off his feet because the redhead had foolhardily decided he could equal the other in a head-on collision.

"Ow, goddamn," Roy gasped out, rocking a bit like a turtle on his back as he tried to catch a second wind. "How are you doing that?"

Roy was starting to understand why Marth always avoided attempts to lock Ike's sword in place with his own. While Marth still maintained speed and agility over Ike, there were times that Roy bore witness to Ike simply getting a grip on Marth and forcing him down to the floor and inevitably winning due to overwhelming strength and power.

"You okay?" Ike helped him up, looking rather worried. "Dude, you're bleeding."

It wasn't until he sniffled and hacked at the metallic taste at the back of his throat did Roy realize his nose must have been hit at some point in this spar. "Fuck, oops. Alright, be right back."

"I got the mats." Ike went to retrieve cleaning supplies as Roy headed for the bathroom.

When Roy re-entered the training area, he noticed Ike and Marth talking in low voices in the center of the mats. The taller man was still holding a roll of paper towels and spray bottle of rubbing alcohol. Marth was dressed like he had just finished lecturing, which seemed about right for this time of day. Upon noticing Roy's return, Marth turned to leave the mat-covered area. They met several feet from the door.

"Hey," Roy greeted with a charming smile. "Spar with me?"

"You tempt me," Marth said with a half-smile in return, "but no one has your inhuman stamina, Roy."

"Boo, you whore," Roy taunted, blowing his friend a raspberry for good measure. "You want to watch me take down the towering monster that is Ike?"

Laughing, Marth shook his head. "Even harder to resist, but I got to run some errands. I'll see you at dinner."

Nodding his understanding, Roy parted ways with his friend and returned to meet Ike where they had left their equipment.

An unreadable expression had crossed Ike's face. "Roy, can I ask you something?" the taller swordsman asked, a tad cautiously, which was unusual enough for a guy who seemed to have no pretentious bone in his body.

"Yeah, shoot." Roy picked up his practice sword and checked it for any noticeable defects. Call it habit.

"You and Marth are old friends, right?"

"Uh-huh," Roy glanced up at Ike and then stated plainly, "but don't ask me for some secret weakness of his, because I don't know it. Hell, I didn't even know bodily picking up the guy and taking him down was an option before I met you."

Unable to compose an appropriate response, Ike stayed silent. His face held a mixture of tension and something else, before he hedged, "R-right. So how about best four out of seven?"

"You are so on."

Then one night on patrol, Roy found two students out past curfew, rolling around in the dark brawling. Of all things to do when it was pitch-black and cold out, they had to be grappling for some dumb testosterone-fueled reason? He yanked them apart, and not recognizing which dorm housed them, demanded to know so they could get chewed off not by one fiery instructor (his magnificent self, of course) but also have consequence and punishment rain down upon their idiotic souls.

It was an understatement to say he was surprised to find Ike in Marth's room upon delivery of said troubled youths. Never mind the fact that the door had been open and the two instructors didn't exude an ounce of suspicious behavior or guilt when Roy arrived, but it still was a bit strange to see someone lounging comfortably on the couch that wasn't himself (or maybe Link, depending on the day).

"Your turn," Roy gruffly said, pushing the two boys into the lion's den to fend for themselves. Good riddance. He turned a suspicious eye onto Ike instead, who stared impassively back at Roy, features schooled to exhibit as much professionalism as possible.

"Thank you." Marth languidly stood from his seat, and the blond student squeaked and backed straight up into Roy, who grumbled and nudged the boy forward. "Lucas, Ness. Bathroom." Dutifully, the boys followed their residence leader to be presumably cleaned up and lambasted.

The dialogue between the adult and preteens in the next room was too low to eavesdrop, and before Roy had any chance to initiate conversation, Ike turned to him and asked, "Don't you think the RA could have handled that?"

Roy couldn't stop the abrupt laugh that spilled out. "Are you kidding? I never met the kids, but I've heard the stories. Extensive history between them—drives the RA crazy—so Marth deals with them." He paused and then smirked at Ike. "Wow, look at you, hanging out with Marth after hours. Should I be jealous?" The look he received from the taller man was anything but understanding, so Roy sighed and tried again, "Your attempts to win him over will never prevail. I hold the most epic bromance with Marth here."

The Oh-I-get-it moment occurred, and Ike laughed loudly. "Don't worry. Your… ah, bromance is perfectly safe. Wouldn't dream of intruding."

There was a muffled wail from the vicinity of the bathroom and Roy grinned. "Man, I love that guy. Twenty bucks that the little blond one is crying right now."

Looking amused, Ike slouched back and resigned himself to listening to the strange mixture of sounds that resounded sporadically from the other side of the room. "You're kind of evil."

"You think?" Roy responded with a healthy amount of fake innocence. "Who is the one making children cry right now, hm?"

"I'm sure that's not his primary objective," Ike defended, although Roy saw a flicker of doubt when two sets of sniffling were heard upon exiting the bathroom. "Urm… I think. Maybe."

"Back to your room now," Marth told the students sternly, after checking to make sure the bandages weren't going anywhere. The boys grimaced as the older man did a final check up on their motley of patched-up injuries. "See you tomorrow morning at six." After murmuring somber confirmations, the students scampered away down the hall.

"Damn, Marth," Roy teased, taking his leave so that he could finish his rounds for the night, "I got to run, but way to make them suffer."

"I did no such thing," Marth replied with a clandestine smile as he habitually fixed his bangs. "Thanks again, Roy."

Roy was going for a run and had so far recruited Pit, but could not find anyone else. The last place he jogged by was the training room, but Link's class had it reserved for at least the next hour.

"Link, hey!" Roy waved from the edge of the mat as he was very unwilling to weave through dozens of tumbling students doing drills.

The blond caught his presence and walked over with a raised eyebrow. "What's up?" Belatedly, Pit eased through the door, decked head to toe in running gear, and the metaphorical light bulb lit up in Link's eyes. "Oh, damn it. You know I want to come with."

"Catch up with us later," Roy easily suggested with a shrug, both of them knowing that Roy was likely to still be out there in ninety minutes, even if Pit retired earlier. "Have you seen Marth? Ike?"

"Equipment room maybe?" Link guessed with a tilt of his head. "I thought I saw them recently, but who knows." The blond watched Roy's eyes widen comically and allowed the redhead to shove him aside as an object sailed past his golden strands.

"Is that a bomb?"

"Jesus fucking Christ," Link swore in exasperation. "If my parents would let me, I would have one less sibling."

The spherical object rolled close enough for the brunet by the door to pick it up. Hefting the weight in his palm, Pit went ahead and pitched the inert toy back at the troublemaker, knocking the little one right in the head.

"Ah, shit. That was a good one," Link mused, so quietly it was almost to himself. "We-e-e-ell, I think I can chalk that up to the risks of training here…"

Leaving the other instructor to contain the chaos, Roy mimed to Pit that he was going to check the equipment room before they left.

"Ma-a-arth?" Roy warbled into the dimly lit room as he yanked open the door. Due to the room's small size, his eyes easily landed on the pair of individuals he currently was seeking. "Wha—"

Dominant hand wrapped tightly around a sword hilt, Marth redirected his focus toward Roy. Voice straining from exertion, Marth greeted breathily, "Hello."

"That is a fucking massive sword—the fuck?!" Roy cried out, unable to keep the slightly hysteric quality out of his own voice. His friend simply mumbled something in the lines of don't-I-already-know-it.

"Uhm…" Ike stood awkwardly beside Marth, who Roy finally figured out was just trying to lift the sword with one-handed ease (and failing terribly). "Thanks?" As if realizing just how strange that sounded, Ike rubbed a hand bashfully through his spikes. "I meant, uh, okay? Yes?"

"This is what you've been swinging for the past who-knows-how-long?" Roy left the door open as an invitation for anyone else to experience the mind-blowing phenomenon and approached the two other instructors. "May I?"

"Go ahead," Ike acquiesced and watched Marth transfer his sword's handle to Roy.

Wrist screaming in protest, Roy immediately forwent lifting the sword with a single arm and set his hands in place for a two-handed grip. This weight had to be a few grades higher than the academy's heaviest practice swords. Although lifted, the sword wobbled in Roy's grip, as he was awfully unfamiliar with balancing something so heavy. "Jeez, Ike, how do you move with this thing?"

Pit stuck his head into the room at the same time Marth answered, "Apparently very slowly," which got him elbowed by Ike, who returned the verbal jab without malice, "You don't see me calling you out on your weak strikes, do you?"

"Oh, Ike, that's amazing," Pit interjected, eyes round in awe. "I admit I suddenly am glad I never got around to asking you for a spar."

About fifteen minutes into their run, Roy nearly tripped over his own shoelaces, and Pit skidded to a stop a few feet in front of him.

"Are you alright?" the brunet asked, concerned at the redhead's frazzled form.

"I'm fine," Roy said automatically, before he had a second thought, "I think. Uh, Pit?"

"Yes?" Pit prompted, while back-pedaling in order to remind Roy to start moving forward again.

Following the other's lead, Roy re-organized his jumbled mind long enough to ask, "When was the last time Marth trained in someone else's style?"

Pit continued to forge ahead, steps light and untroubled. "Are you referring to Ike's offer to help accustom Marth to a heavier sword?"

"Sure?" He actually wasn't exactly sure that was what he had meant, but it seemed close enough. Roy bit his lip and tried to pick up his pace, lest Pit find him out of sorts. "I mean, Falchion's practically an extension of Marth's body. Hell, he uses it better than his legs sometime." Roy fondly recalled the last time he watched Marth stumble in practice. It was nice to know his friend was still human beneath all that deadly accuracy.

"It makes sense to practice with something heavier," Pit pointed out and reasoned, "because even if Marth sticks with Falchion, he'll develop more force, which will translate into speed without the extra weight."

Roy practically fell over himself again. "Shit, you're right."

Pit shot Roy a half-annoyed, half-amused look. "When have I been wrong?" The brunet allowed a few seconds to pass before adding, "You can be so overdramatic sometimes."

"How dare you!" Roy gasped and acted offended with an ostentatious hand flourish. "I am perfectly dramatic!"

They jogged in compatible silence and Roy managed to keep his tumultuous thoughts to himself until they started their third circle around academy grounds. "Hey, Pit."

"Yes?" the other instructor was starting to sound a little winded, which wasn't unexpected.

"Do you think something's going on between Marth and Ike?"

With a heavy exhale, Pit slowed to a walk, holding up a hand as an unspoken signal for Roy to stop running. "How…where in the world… where did you get that idea?" The brunet asked dubiously between panting breaths.

"You don't get a weird vibe?" Somehow the redhead felt surprised, as he secretly assumed Pit knew more than he let on. And the guy could get away with it, what with that perpetually childlike appearance. After all, Pit was known to blend in with his students most days.

"Wait, wait, wait," Pit repeated as he massaged his temple, "Ike offers some of his expertise and you think he—what is the term—wants into Marth's pants?"

Upon hearing such a phrase and accompanying (scarring) mental image, Roy was sure he probably turned red. "Uh, no." Yes? "That is not where…" I think? "Well, I wasn't thinking, uh, that exactly…"

"But you were," the shorter man declared with a certainty that was turning out to be unfortunately called for.

"Okay, yes, but only because you just said it out loud," Roy rationalized, throwing up his hands in the universal sign of I-totally-give-up.

"Roy," Pit drew out the redhead's name deliberately and then spoke as if to a toddler, "We all have swords and spend an inordinate amount of time sparring. What makes you think Ike and Marth are doing anything different?"

After being told quite bluntly by a typically encouraging colleague that he was probably overthinking a nonexistent issue, Roy just had to walk in on Ike holding Marth's hand.

Hands, actually.

Shaking his head rapidly to clear the screaming alarms going off in his mind, Roy was quick to repeat to himself over and over again that it was totally normal for one guy to be supporting the other's grip around a sword in order to point out the correct neutral position.

Right.

With a huge sigh that likely rivaled Ike's fucking sword (why, yes, Roy had decided that was the appropriate adjective to forever be attached to that dismally inferiority-complex-inducing sword), he backed straight out of the room despite the pair of swordsmen calling out an invitation for him to join them. When he arrived at Link's office, he was met with a post-it note stating, 'Outside.' The 'if you can find me' was left unwritten. Roy smirked upon realizing the current time slot was that of Link's supposed office hours, but apparently the host was playing hooky.

It took him nearly twenty-five minutes to find Link, who was well-hidden not only due to how expansive 'outside' was, but because the blond was sleeping rather deeply within a dense patch of forestry.

"Why the hell do schools always involve a damn creepy forest?" Roy grumbled to himself as he tried to tousle the stray leaves out of his hair. Standing over the napping instructor, Roy had the insane urge to kick the guy awake.

So he did. Lightly, of course.

With a yelp, Link woke up and rolled into a startled, but defensive crouch, one hand gripping a palm-sized object and the other groping for a misplaced sword.

With raised eyebrows, Roy held up his hands in apology. "Whoa, dude, is that a live explosive?"

"What?" Link's eyes were feverishly bright even if he wasn't fully aware of his surroundings yet. When it dawned on him, the blond huffed and sneakily removed any weapons of mass destruction from wandering sight. "What? No. Of course not! You must be mistaken," Link answered unconvincingly and ran a hand through mussed hair agitatedly. "Wow, Roy. See if I ever do anything nice for you again."

"Sorry about that," Roy said, sounding so truly apologetic that he could see the blond grudgingly forgive him, but it never hurt to butter the guy up, so the redhead concluded with, "but fuck your catlike reflexes."

Link barked out a short laugh. "This better be good."

"Ike and Marth," Roy offered as a dangling carrot.

Interest lit up all of the blond's features. "Oh, this is good."

"Please tell me you think something is going on between them." Roy really just wanted someone to reassure him that he wasn't imagining it.

Link's mouth twisted in a manner of someone trying tremendously not to laugh. "You're telling me," the blond started with pure, unadulterated hilarity dancing in his eyes, "that you ship Ike and Marth." Link started to snicker behind one hand, hunching over to restrain himself from scaring every woodland creature in a hundred foot radius.

"I'm not even sure what that means," Roy hurriedly defended, smacking Link in the shoulder for being so entertained with the whole deal.

"Dude, I think that ship has sailed," Link informed with a sly grin.

"I still don't know what that means!" Roy retaliated with a groan of frustration.

The next time Roy spotted the couple in question was on a beautiful afternoon in broad daylight. Swords were drawn. Falchion and that one huge fucking—

Needless to say, the redhead freaked.

"What the hell?!" he yelled across the field as he raced toward the poised swordsmen. "MARTH!"

"Hey, Roy," Ike spoke first, swinging that (fucking) gigantic thing over one shoulder like it didn't weigh a ton and a half. Overdramatic much? No way. "You want in?"

"I do not want in. I don't do MENAGE A TROIS," Roy retorted instantly, glaring accusingly at the taller man with contempt.

Leaving Ike to stand aside and mutter uh-what? to himself, Roy rushed over and grabbed Marth by the shoulders. Shaking his friend (but minding the fact that the guy was armed and very able to kill him in half a second in this very vulnerable position), he babbled out, "This is not the way to settle unresolved sexual tension!"

Ever-so-rare bafflement morphed across Marth's face and was then accompanied by, "Excuse me?"

"Please, I don't want to watch, hear, or even think of you guys clashing swords," Roy pleaded in a manner tinged with desperation. "There is not enough brain bleach in the world…"

"Roy, what are you talking about?" Ike asked as he approached them after having come to terms that he just won't understand how this conversation had come about any time soon.

"Yes, I would like to know too," Marth seconded stiffly, still trapped in place by Roy's white-knuckled grip.

Roy gave Ike a look that could melt metal. "Look, I'm sure you're a nice guy and all…" Here the redhead chose to conveniently ignore Ike's self-justifying interruption of But-I-am? "…but you can't just come in with your fucking big-ass sword—which by the way, you must be overcompensating for something—and try and bone my best friend. That's not cool."

"Uh…" Ike was left rather dumbfounded by the whole speech, and it took a few attempts to construct a workable sentence. "I… I don't…wasn't… I mean, I'm not—"

"Your wholesome act doesn't work on me!" Roy warned, releasing Marth only long enough to swing his friend behind him in order to protect him from this fiend. "I won't believe that you grew up with a white picket fence and golden retriever!"

"Overcompensating," Ike finished with a quirked eyebrow at this newfound development. Despite the circumstances, it was a bit overkill that Roy had just placed himself as a barrier between Ike and Marth.

Snorting in disbelief, the redhead leveled a superior gaze at Ike. "Trust me. We can all take a shower right now and prove you wr—" A shiver of fear wracked straight down his spine as seemingly delicate fingers wrapped around his shoulder from behind.

Marth was centimeters from incapacitating him using a well-placed hold, and they both knew it.

"Roy."

The addressee haltingly turned his head to meet the other's exceptionally displeased expression. The redhead couldn't even respond to his own name. He may or may not have whimpered.

"We'll talk about this later," Marth stated in his patented no-nonsense tone.

Speechless, Roy nodded mechanically and trudged back up across the field to the academy.

Watching the other swordsman leave the premise, Ike hazarded a glance at the shorter man next to him. Unruffled as ever, Marth stood with a hand on his hip, sword clenched in one hand and eagle-like eyes tracking his friend's retreating figure into the distance.

When completely alone without anyone within earshot, Ike jammed Ragnell into the grass in order to lean nonchalantly on it. "I thought we resolved our sexual tension."

Marth sighed. "I suppose we could try again."

-fin-

Author's Notes: If anyone took a shot for every time I had to use the word 'sword,' alcohol poisoning would have set in about 1000 words into this one-shot.

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