Photo: the Temple of Apollo in Delphi.

POV: DANTE

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In Delphi, the three of them shared a room together again. But this time, the beds were placed next to each other, like a double bed, but triple. Dante was laying on the middle bed during the ending of the day, and Gideon was more clingy than ever. Currently, he was, despite the focus being on him mostly as the beds were in the center of the room, resting his head on Dante's lap while making ambiguous remarks, being his own flirty self. Dante looked away, to Noel. But he hadn't seen the ocean since... that moment. He missed the ocean.

Noel was laughing with Amber, and Dante looked back at the wall that was not the wall.

He messed it all up with his oculi. Gideon was more flirty than ever and Noel was distancing from them and spent a lot of time with Amber. He missed how it was before, the friendship they had.

He was thinking so much that he completely missed the speech and all, until everyone was leaving. Amber proposed to spend the last night of their trip haunting the hotel as well. 

'I am really exhausted,' said Dante.

So he stayed alone in the room, staring at the ceiling.

He had to admit, he was not thát exhausted, but he didn't really feel like watching his two friends flirting with girls, and he didn't feel like flirting himself, and he wanted to be alone.

He stripped to his boxershort and crept under the blanket of the middle bed, but his brain kept running and running and as soon as he closed his eyes he saw the ocean with the dark depths and opens his eyes again. In the darkness, he kept seeing Gideon now, so he switched the lamp on Noel's night stand on. And he smelled Noel's smell strongly, so he switched the lamp on Gideon's night stand on as well and stared at the wall and let himself fall back onto his pillow and stared at the ceiling again and closed his eyes once more. This time, the darkness was less strong.

The spinning, strange loudness in his head had almost quieted down completely, but then he heard the door being opened and the atonal orchestra in his head continued to howl. 

The lights went out. He heard the quiet breath of the darkness and soft thuds of clothes falling to the ground. Then, he felt a flush of cold at his leg, followed by the warmth of Gideon's body, they didn't touch each other but he could feel him very intensely. He saw how the dark depths observed him in the dark. He heard his own crazy heart beating, but maybe it was Gideon's as well. He smelled a vague hint of Gideon's shampoo.

For seconds, both of them laid completely still. Then, there was movement and Dante could now taste the darkness as well.

When Gideon pulled back, Dante's world was spinning out of control. The wall twisted, distorted and fell, and he found himself in the dark depths, but the depths were soft, like velvet pillows on his lips, he absorbed the darkness, the darkness absorbed him.

'I know you're awake, handsome~'

Dante opened his oculi and saw Gideon, the doorknob still in his hand, completely dressed, with a wide smirk on his face. The lights were still on and the wall was still the same.

He frowned and touched his lips.

'What?' Gideon lifted an eyebrow.

'N-no, nothing.' Dante muttered. If he wasn't asleep, who was it then? But it had been Gideon's smell. Gideon's full lips. Gideon's dark sensation. But...

"Strange," he thought, "very strange."