"Johnny," Nine whined. "Can we please break for food now?"

"You can go eat whenever."

Nine frowned as John started to walk away from him, heading over to Adam. They were trying to calm down a Mog enough for one of the healers to take care of their leg. Nine watched from where he was standing as John looked into the Mogs eyes before the Mog slumped over unconscious. The healer moved over and was able to do their job, but Adam was glaring up at John.

Nine sighed and rolled his shoulders.

Night had definitely set in a couple hours ago, but not all the Mogs had been healed, surveyed, and placed. A couple of them had tried to overpower some of the teachers, so Nine and John had to run after them and upgrade their containment.

"Nine!" someone called, making Nine turn around. Sam was jogging towards him, a clipboard in his hand.

"What's wrong?" Nine asked.

"Uh, Malcolm wanted me to talk to you, well, I mean, he wanted to talk to you about this himself, but he's really busy, so-"

"To the point, Sam?"

Sam cringed a little at the obvious annoyance in Nine's voice. "Right. John told Malcolm to put him on the list for Mog watching a bunch. He's scheduled for pretty much the rest of the night."

"Fucking fantastic," Nine sighed as he took the clipboard from Sam. And as Sam said John was written in several slots for watching over a group of dangerous Mogs. "You or Six scheduled?"

"Yeah," Sam sighed. "I only have one shift."

"Great, you're getting another," Nine replied as he pulled out a pen and crossed John's name off one of the spots. He wrote Sam's name near it. He did the same thing two more times, but instead wrote his name.

Then he gave the clipboard back. "Thanks Sam, see you at midnight," Nine said.

Sam gave a sad sigh. "Great," he said sarcastically.

"C'mon," Nine urged, but it was lighter now that John had given in and was following him to Nine's home. He let Nine guide him around houses and up to the large mountain with several gaping holes in its side that were caves.

Nine took him into what was basically an extension of his office. This was inside the main part of the academy, where there were other classrooms and offices connected throughout cave openings or building extensions.

John had seen Nine's office, helped set it up and direct students there, but he'd never seen the part that was connected to it. Calling it sad would be an understatement in John's mind. The door that separated his office and bedroom was obviously put together hastily. It was uneven and wasn't connected to anything, just wedged into the opening in the stone.

Nine pried the door open until both of them could slip through the gap it left.

The inside was small, but there was barely anything to fill the space anyways. A flimsy mattress was covered with nothing but a blanket, both of which were atop a rickety bed frame. All the caves had been carved out to better resemble rooms, but Nine's floor was still uneven, covered with a rug made of tough grasses woven together. A duffel bag was in a corner of Nine's room, clothes spilling out of it.

Light came from a lamp on the floor, plugged into an extension cord that ran the length of the room.

"This is your room?" John asked.

Nine was toeing his shoes off, kicking them near his bed frame. "Yeah. It's not great, but the bed's comfy."

Getting everyone into a living situation had been hard, and most were still sharing their makeshift homes with other people. John had thought about letting a group of students or teachers take his house for awhile now. But he'd made it himself, without the help of any legacies, even his telekinesis.

"How many of the other teacher's are living like this?"

Nine stared at John, studying him for a moment, before he answered. "Most of them." Nine began to take his shirt off after he answered John.

John frowned at him. "I'll need you to get a group of teachers that won't mind sharing a house for a while."

"Why's that?"

"They'll live in my house. It's too nice for just one person to be living there."

"But it's not just one person now," Nine reminded him. "Adam's there, too."

"Adam can live with Malcolm. You probably should, too," John added at the end when he looked around Nine's room again.

"And what about you?" Nine asked, walking up to him.

"I'll find something."

Nine placed his hands on John's waist as he frowned. "How about this: I make my office and room into an actually decent space for somebody, and then I can come live with you and Adam." He added a seductive tone to his voice at the last part and pulled John closer to his body.

John sighed in frustration, but didn't push away from Nine's body. "We're supposed to be eating, remember?"

True, Nine had only been able to get John away from his responsibilities by telling him that all he wanted was for John to eat, and then he could return to the Mogs. At first John had questioned why they needed to eat at Nine's place instead of somewhere closer, but eventually had been too exhausted and overwhelmed by everything else to continue with his arguments.

"Ugh, how could I forget, Johnny? I've been starvin' all damn night," Nine replied with a groan. He parted himself from John to sit on his bed and pick up a tupperware container. John joined him on the bed, across from him.

Condensation had built up all over the lid of the container, and when Nine unlatched it and pulled it off there was a bit of steam that rose from it. Inside was a very thick stew.

"Man, I dunno what I would've done if one of the chefs hadn't stayed," Nine said, fishing out wooden utensils from a small bag John hadn't noticed before.

Only one of the four main cooks had followed Nine and Malcolm to New Lorien. They didn't even have the luck of it being the head chef. Back at the California Academy the cooks had helpers for preparing dishes and sorting ingredients; hardly any of those stayed either, but many of the students had decided to help and now cooked meals alongside the new head chef.

The stew must've been a decent temperature, because Nine kept shoving heaps of it into his mouth. To John, temperatures didn't matter much anymore. It was more about what felt good or not. If it felt intense, it probably wasn't a good temperature. But the stew sat nicely in John's mouth, and the texture of the thick broth proved it wasn't extremely hot.

But John didn't eat much of it, watching Nine scarf it down instead. He got up from the bed, stretching his arms far above his head. He was tired from using his legacies so much, but knew there were more important things to attend to than sleep.

He moved a few steps towards Nine's door, only to be stopped when Nine wrapped his arms around him.

"Nine," he said sternly.

Nine dropped his head onto John's shoulder, rubbing his nose into his neck. "Yes?"

"Let me go."

"Why?" Nine whispered, placing an open mouthed kiss on John's neck afterwards.

"You know why," John said coldly.

Nine hummed against John's skin as he left more kisses there. He licked a stripe up to John's ear before taking his earlobe into his mouth. He sucked and nibbled on it.

"I don't have time for this."

Nine pulled his mouth away. "Yes, you do. I put Ella and Malcolm in charge of finishing up. You need to sleep before your shifts. I, uh, thought I could help tire you out?"

"I should be there with the rest of them," John said while he shook his head. "It's my responsibility."

Nine didn't react for a few seconds. John took that time to try to continue his argument, but wasn't able to get a full word out before Nine was lifting him up. John planted his hands against the arms around his waist, both to help steady himself and to try to push away Nine.

Nine spun them around as he moved to his bed, flopping onto it and bringing John with him.

"Nine!" John huffed, immediately sitting up once he was free from Nine's arms.

Nine wiggled out from behind and underneath him, and repositioned himself over John's legs. He used both hands to push against John's chest and made him fall back onto the bed.

"I'm serious, Nine," John warned, but stopped fighting back.

"And so am I." John met Nine's eyes with a glare. "You know they can handle this, and I know you're tired." Nine put a bit of bite into his words, meeting John's glare with one of his own. But his glare ended up fading to a smirk when John didn't immediately have a witty comeback.

"They need my legacies," John countered eventually, but there was no fight in the words. He knew that the most dangerous Mogs had already been calmed down and housed somewhere.

Nine leaned down with a soft kiss, just their lips pressed against each other. "Stay here, Johnny."

John didn't try to argue again with Nine as he shifted them so they could get under the blanket. John let himself be wrapped in Nine's arms, and didn't protest when the lamp was turned off.

"Now, go to sleep." Nine told him strictly.

John didn't reply to him, choosing instead to rest a hand on the side of Nine's body and close his eyes.