superhuman

NINE

Dallon embraces him the second he sees him.
The taller man's face presses into his shoulder, neck crooked at a weird angle to make up for the ten-inch height difference between the two, hands resting on his jean-clad hips.
"I'm so glad you're okay." His voice sounds teary, and when Pete gently tugs away he sees tears in Dallon's baby blue eyes.

Brendon pats his shoulder, grinning as he greets him.
"You look like hell." He offers, and Pete lets out a sound of agreement.
"Mikey fucked me up pretty bad," His hands ghosted over his ribs, letting out a sharp hiss of pain as his unhealed ribs sting. "Four broken ribs, three broken fingers, chipped a tooth, lost a clump of hair and bruised up my jaw, forehead, chest and scraped up my knees real bad. How long was I out?"
"Two weeks, with accelerated healing and a lot of prayer." Spencer butts in, quietly, "You missed a lot."
"What do you mean?" Pete's alert and worried, and he tries to will his hands to stop shaking.
"We got some new Talenteds in. Cool guys, so far; most from a hijacked compound down south that was compromised not that long ago. They're all pretty weird so far - Dal's very suspicious.." Brendon jabs his husband in the side, making him squawk and yell in protest. Spencer rolls his eyes, before swiveling around on his bench to gesture to a table of strangers, plus Patrick. Pete feels his stomach churn nervously as he catches eyes with him. Patrick's cheeks burn light pink as he turns to talk to a short blue-haired kid with a lip piercing instead, his cheeks still glazed a soft crimson.
He feels a bony elbow jab into his side as a lanky-legged Hispanic guy sits beside him, grinning.
"Wentz!" He cheers, clapping him over the shoulder, "I haven't seen you in forever, buddy!"
Pete squirms, smiling weakly. "Nice to see you too, Gabe."

"I don't know you." A boy with short, fading dyed red hair sitting across from him scowls, crossing his arms across his chest. Gabe flicks him in the forehead. "Wrong Gabe, genuis."
The boy kicks him in the shin, hard, making Gabe double over in pain, screaming bloody murder.
"Gabriel!" The blue haired kid Patrick had been talked to storms over, yelling - the Gabriel in question smiles sheepishly.
"Sorry, Tricky.." He raises his eyebrows and shrugs, smiling a little with a slight shrug. The blue haired kid rolls their eyes, sitting beside him neatly. They adjust their plaid shirt before looking up at Gabe and Pete. "Oh, hello. I'm Patrick, but Trick is fine. This is my best friend, Gabriel." Gabriel looks up suddenly at the mention of his name; stopping the lovestruck staring he'd been doing previously. Trick flushes pink, shoving their best friend, mumbling profanities towards the redhead. Gabriel pokes his tongue out at his best friend, playfully swiping at Trick, who shrieks and launches themself at Gabriel, who lets out a sound that would've put one of the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park to shame.
Pete can't help but laugh at the squabbling teens, snickering as Trick swipes at their friend's hair, Gabriel screaming bloody murder as he locks his legs around Trick's waist and dragging them down to the floor as the two slam into the concrete floor, play fighting before rolling onto the feet of a rather unimpressed Dallon.
"Can you two please explain what you two think you're doing?" He's got his 'snooty college professor' voice on, and he stares them down as the two wrangle from their tangle of limbs, smiling sheepishly.
"Sorry, Mr. Weekes." The two chorus nervously; Gabriel plays with his hair and Trick swats his hand, sprouting another playfight.

"Children!" Dallon yells, grabbing Gabriel by the shoulders, much to his complaint, and pulling him away. He glares at the much much taller man, pouting slightly in an attempt to at least gain a little sympathy. It doesn't work. "It was their fault!" Gabriel replies indignantly, "I didn't do anything!"
"Liar!" Trick shoots back, "You hit me first!"
"No I didn't!"
"Did too!"
"Did not!"
Pete tunes out of their squabble after the third loop of it, preffering instead to look at Patrick, who's talking animatedly to Spencer. He's a lot interesting when he talks; his hands move and flail; he scrunches his nose up when he laughs and covers his mouth with one hand; his mouth naturally gravitates uptwards as he speaks, betraying him with a lopsided smile.
"He has a nice smile," Pete thinks absently, and finds himself smiling softly as Patrick lets out a full body laugh, doubling over and smacking at his leg with one hand for effect. It's really cute and Pete can't stop the grin that starts to spread.
Then Patrick looks over to him, still smiling, and his stomach coils and his heart starts thudding. His legs feel like Jello and his mouth feels drier than a desert. It's like the feeling he got back when he was dating his ex girlfriend - a beautiful girl named Ashlee. She was kind, beautiful, funny - and smart, too. She was smart enough to leave him when she had the chance, before he got into the drugs and before any of this happened.
She reminds him of Patrick, in some ways; the honey coloured hair, the pretty eyes, the full lips. He tries not to think of her as Patrick calls him over to sit.

Pete wills his legs - which are still trembling - to be still as he says a quick goodbye to Gabe, Gabriel and Trick, who have long since forgotten about him and are chatting among themselves, and strolls towards the table Patrick, Spencer and three strangers are seated at.
There's two guys that Pete doesn't recognise; one looks about 12, with dark hair and honey colored eyes, in a leather jacket and a little bit of eyeliner (what was this, 2007?) and another with neck length black hair, a lip piercing and almost as many tattoos as Pete.
A pretty girl with long, honey brown hair in loose curls waves to him; she smiles sweetly, brushing her hair behind her ears and nipping at her lip with her front teeth. Pete's almost astounded at how beautiful she is.
"Meagan, tune it down." Patrick snaps at the pretty girl; she narrows her cocoa colored eyes at him, before they flash red and she hisses at him, revealing a full set of snake fangs. Pete's understandably a little shocked by this, and Meagan just smiles sweetly, albeit still with the snake teeth.
"I'm Ryan," It takes him a moment to realize Eyeliner is holding out his hand for him to shake; he takes it, and straightaway retracts it as needles pierce into his skin. He shakes his hand out as if it's on fire, trying to remove the tiny hooklike barbs that settled into his palm.
"I'm so sorry!" Ryan looks more confused than apologetic; his wide brown eyes are filled with terror, and he instinctively pulls his hands up to cover his face, whimpering out what sounds like "please don't hurt me" under his breath.
"I'm so sorry, Ryan sometimes gives off barbs without realizing it. He's a plant manipulator. Look on the bright side, though, it could have been vines.." Spencer apologizes for the trembling boy, who's still hiding behind his hands; he strokes his back comfortingly, assuring that Pete wouldn't hurt him like 'the other guy' did.
Patrick bites his lip and Pete notices his fingers clasped around the wooden base of the bench, knuckles white.
For a few moments, it's silent, before Patrick inhales deeply and stands, a forced-looking smile across his face. "Does anyone want food? I'm gonna go grab a platter, I'll be back soon."

Pete totally doesn't stare at his ass when he leaves.

Totally.

a/n // iM SORRY FOR NOT UPDATING FOR 185933 YEARS
P LE ASE FORGIVE ME I DIDN'T EVEN REALIZE

fun life updates - I have a crush and its killing me. (they're probably reading this so <3 hello ur so cute and u make me cri everitim pls)
also, i had my first kiss 8/12/15 and it was weird and def not worth it ew (it wasn't my crush either tbh)

ok i should stop talking about my personal life ;;

WHICH WOULD YOU GUYS WANT MORE

a - peterick smut later
or
b - peterick smut... less later

either way there's gay sex so *shrugging emojii*

LET ME KNOW PLEASE ITS IMPORTANT

- xogbrl