A/N: So, I had something written and when I sent it to my Triplets for their input, I found out that I'd ganked one of Nana's story ideas. Like, super hard. And I hadn't even realized just how badly I'd done it until she read it and pointed out all the different things that were supposed to be in her own story. I'd assumed that the crazy inspiration I'd gotten while writing had been totally random, but found out that I was just remembering the shit we'd talked about with her own story, while simultaneously forgetting that it was for her story. I mean, that's top-level shit-sandwich actions on my part. So I deleted it and I'm doing this over again.

All I can be happy about is that I found out I'd plagiarized before putting this story up, so I was able to fix my enormous mistake.

So without further ado, I give you…

Day 5: Serpent

Noodle Canoodle

Cobra was sideways on the bed, on his back and snoring like a chainsaw. That, in itself, was weird. He never snored. The only sound he made in his sleep was the occasional clearing of his throat and grinding his teeth when he wasn't wearing the night-guard the dentist gave him. Based on the little note Midnight had left on the bedroom door, she was going to assume that a drunk Cobra snored. That was fine.

Lucy gazed down at her husband where he laid on the bed, then snuck back out of the bedroom, down the hall, and toward the living room. She didn't bother picking up her bags from her latest job to try and start sorting dirty laundry. She didn't even care about getting a bath like she'd been planning on doing just hours before while trekking back to Magnolia. Instead, she picked up the plastic bin from just beside her muddy boots and carried it back to the bedroom.

She took the bin over to the empty terrarium that sat beneath the window, then looked down at the writhing mass of baby snakes she'd found on her job. She'd missed Cobra's birthday because of the emergency job she'd had to take with the team. This was her way of making it up to him. Snake babies.

The snoring stopped when she picked up the first little black snake. Lucy turned toward the bed with a gentle smile, watching as Cobra rolled so his head hung off one side of the bed.

Maybe it would be better to wake him up.

She put the bin on the bed beside the pillows, and went to the bathroom to get a glass of water. Once she was back in the room, and had set the glass on the floor, Lucy crawled onto the bed and laid herself down beside Cobra. One hand slid over his back, her fingers rising and dipping along with his whip-scars, and she whispered his name. He didn't wake up.

"Erik, wake up," Lucy said. She started massaging the space between his shoulders, his neck, up into his hair. Behind his ears. "Come on, sweetheart. Time to wake up."

"No," he mumbled.

"I brought you a present."

"Don' fuggin… care."

"Fine," she giggled. "I guess I'll name them myself."

He breathed deeply and turned his head toward her, smacking his lips in the process. "Name wha'?"

"The noodle babies I got you."

Cobra frowned. His eye still didn't open. "Nood… huh?"

"Are you awake?" Her smile softened when he nodded. "I'll roll you over, okay?" Cobra nodded again. She already knew that trying to move him if he wasn't fully conscious was a sure-fire way to get a fist flying at her face before his eye opened. She was just happy that she had some pretty good anti-black eye reflexes. The best way to counteract his waking-punch tendency was to tell him what she was going to do before doing it.

Lucy sat up on her knees and rolled him onto his back. She reached over his bare stomach - she wasn't sure when his shirt had come off the night before while she was gone, but at least he was wearing boxers - and brought the bin next to her knees.

"Okay, time to name them," she said, carding her fingers through his hair once again. She picked up the first of five snakes and looked at its thin black body. "This is Doodle Noodle." She placed it on Cobra's stomach, smiling wider when it simply coiled around his belly button. Cobra hummed and turned his head a little more toward her hand while her nails raked over his scalp. "This is…" She picked up the next snake, nearly identical to the first except for a few white scales around its snout. "Rainbow Noodle." Lucy placed it on Cobra's chest.

He hummed again. "Doodle… Rainbow…"

She pulled out the third snake, with a long white stripe running down only one side, and set it on his stomach. "This is… Speedington Noodle."

"Mm… Doodle, Rainbow, Speedingt…"

Lucy giggled and shook her head, then pulled out the last two snakes. One had milky eyes, and the other was more grey than black. She put the milky-eyed snake near his cheek on the bed. "Here's Scout Noodle." The grey one slithered down her hand to rest in Cobra's armpit. "And Creeper Noodle."

"Mmkay," he mumbled. "Sleep now."

"But you'll squish our babies," she said.

"Squish what?"

"Open your eye."

He sighed and finally forced his eye to open. It took a minute for him to realize there was something on top of him. Several somethings, actually. Cobra frowned and blinked repeatedly before he found the ability to look down at the slight weight on his throat. A small, blind snake's head sat perched above his chin. Its tongue flicked out several times to test the air.

"The hell…"

"That's Scout Noodle," she said. Lucy picked up Rainbow Noodle before it could fall off Cobra's chest and placed the little snake back with its siblings. "I found them on my way home, and I figured…"

He knew what she meant, even without hearing her soul. He'd been devastated when his last snake, Gambit, had contracted IBD from fuck only knew where. That precious little python had stopped eating, and he couldn't figure out what had happened. Not until it was too late, at least. Cobra hadn't known what it was, but he'd taken Gambit to the vet, only to find out the little guy had some incurable disease that could have been passed down to him from before he'd even hatched, or from some weird mites, or a number of other places.

Lucy had been the one to convince him that putting Gambit down was the humane thing to do. He was going to die anyway, and forcing him to live when they would have to force-feed him just to prolong his life a few more months, was going to hurt them all. Gambit would have suffered. Cobra would have gotten more attached, and been more devastated when Gambit was eventually past caring for.

They'd gotten rid of the old terrarium after Gambit was gone, and bleached the whole house just to be safe. Cobra had bought a new terrarium though, because he did want to get another snake. Eventually.

"You found…"

"Five little noodle babies," she said with a gentle smile. She remembered all too well how Cobra had cried once they were home after putting Gambit down. She didn't want that to happen again. "I took them to the vet before coming home. Clean bills of health all around."

"Five…"

"Baby noodles."

"Black racers?"

She shrugged. "I think? The paperwork's in the kitchen. Aside from Scout Noodle being blind and Creeper Noodle having a sort of albino thing going on, they're normal. Well, normal for snakes."

"Blind?" Fuck, his brain was not working with him right then. And his head was starting to hurt.

Lucy held up Scout Noodle again. "Blind," she said. "I thought you might want to put them in their new home. I still don't know how it all works."

Cobra sighed while closing his eye again. He let himself relax with the feeling of those small, scaly bodies wriggling on his bare flesh, and a small smile lifted his lips. "In a minute."

"Ah," Lucy said with a nod, "It's noodle bonding time."

"Why the fuck are you calling them noodles?"

"You talk in your sleep," she said. It was a lie, and they both knew it. She just really thought calling snakes noodles was precious. "I just assumed it was the appropriate vernacular for snakes."

"You're an asshole."

She smirked and carefully laid down beside him again, making sure all five of their new children were either on him or next to him (and not under her). "You don't remember what you did… do you."

"No," he sighed. "Aside from drinking nail polish... I feel like I missed something."

"I'm gonna guess… constant masturbation."

"I fucking hate you."

"Lies," she laughed, biting her lips when he winced. "Too loud?"

"Very…" Cobra's eye clenched and he turned his head toward her. "Do me a favor…" His eye barely opened again to find her smiling down at him, just like she always did. "I'm calling in one of my bitch days."

"You want me to take care of you today?"

He nodded slowly. He only had four bitch days in a year when he could just be lazy and not do a damn thing, and Lucy would take care of him; Lucy had the same, where all she usually wanted was to get pampered by him with no complaints. Of course, they'd both decided that injuries from missions didn't count toward bitch days. Thank god for that. "Please?"

Lucy leaned down at pressed her lips to his forehead. "You got it. You stay here with the babies, and I'll get you some crackers for breakfast."

"You're the best." His lips pursed when she pulled away. "Hey…"

"Yes?"

"You didn't say it…" Was he whining? Yes. Definitely, yes.

She rolled her eyes and pressed her lips to his forehead again. "I love you, Mister Grump."

Cobra gave her a sleepy smile when their noses brushed together. He loved that she was perfectly fine telling him how she felt about him, and never expected him to reciprocate. And that Lucy didn't need to know the reason why. She'd just accepted that as a fact about him, and that was that. He'd probably only said that he loved her a total of three times in the past eight years of their marriage. But she told him every morning and night, sometimes even when she was just getting up from the couch to get a bag of chips. Somehow, she knew that he really needed to know that, to hear it, even if he wouldn't admit it. What mattered most was that she never forgot how much he loved her, regardless of how seldom he said the words.

"How much?" That didn't mean Cobra was above making Lucy tell him how much she loved him. Especially because she was adorably sappy on occasion, and he really didn't mind it all that much when it was coming from her.

"I super duper ooper schmooper love you, Noodle Canoodler." He hummed while closing the distance between them, and Lucy's nose wrinkled when they pulled apart and his dry lips stuck to hers. She'd always hated that about morning kisses.

"Mmkay, go now, minion," he yawned.

Lucy shook her head and moved to sit up, then frowned down at her chest. "Erik?"

"Mm?"

"Creeper Noodle is creeping on my tits."

Cobra's eye opened to a slit, and he snorted at the sight of the little grey snake nestled between Lucy's boobs, with its head peeking out from her cleavage. "You're the one who doesn't want human babies."

"You don't either."

"True. So let Creeper Noodle go all Oedipus on you. Little dudeling's living up to his name." Lucy let out a quiet laugh and counted four snakes writhing on Cobra's stomach. She slowly sat up and made her way to the kitchen, ignoring the small snake nestled between her breasts. Cobra waved her away and smiled to himself. He picked up a random snake - Doodle Noodle, maybe? - and said, "I married a fucking keeper."

.The End.

I think there's a headcanon in here from either Dragon'shost or papalogia. Cobra getting drunk on nail polish. It's been so long, I can't remember whose it was. Credit where it's due, even if I can't remember who to credit it to lol.