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[prodigalfirelord]

The doors to the council chambers slammed shut on another long day of politicking.

" - and send that word to the colonies immediately." A messenger moved swiftly on his way, as the Fire Nation's generals followed their Fire Lord from his council chambers.

One attempted to take the council beyond its chambers. "My lord, I still wonder if you understand -"

"General Hso." The Fire Lord did his best to favor his general with an understated and not at all bored out of his mind smile. "My respect for your knowledge of Earth Desert trade routes surpasses all others, but I think I've absorbed all I can on the subject for today. Until we reconvene."

He bowed, and the general reluctantly bowed in return. Zuko was playing the dance, soothing the egos, managing not to yawn through the council meetings - which, in times of peace, were so dull that attending them felt like running headlong into a battle. He'd thought, once, in his callow youth - all five years ago - that in peacetime, the council wouldn't have much to talk about. Hso was not even the most talkative one to prove him wrong.

Comments

[prodigalfirelord]

"You could have just gotten one in the Fire Nation for free, you know. You should have asked."

Or maybe Zuko should have offered.

"Eh. I guess I'm missing one back at the palace."

[boobhat]

"That would've just been weird," said Hiccup. "'Hi Zuko, I'm not here to see you. I have an afternoon facial with your servant girl, followed by hot stone massage. I'll see you later.' Besides, how often do I actually stay in the palace, instead of the two of us running off with Aang and the others or heading right back to he ship to go on a mission?"

He added, "I'm not really used to luxuries. I'm even less used to asking friends for them."

[prodigalfirelord]

"Oh, well." Zuko paused, awkward. "You could do that. It's not like I don't have the servants to spare."

The estheticians at the spa greeted them warmly, ushering them into a room with two comfy-looking padded massage tables, each with a small towel on each of them.

Zuko, used to this routine, started stripping, regardless of the lack of robes provided to them.

[boobhat]

"So which spa workers' benefit is that for?" Hiccup jibed, starting to strip himself.

They'd need the robes. After the facial, there was a full body silkweed wrap (whatever that was), and a couples' massage, and Zuko's finely sculpted butt -

Hiccup realized he was staring and turned away, his cheeks growing a little pink.

Boy, it sure was hot in here. Probably to foster relaxation.

[prodigalfirelord]

"Uh, the masseuse? Because massaging people through fabric would be weird."

Much weirder than stripping in front of his friend and fake boyfriend.

Zuko grabbed the little towel off his table, wrapping it around his waist to conceal the finely sculpted butt, before turning around.

"You're telling me a chief's son doesn't get any sort of pampering on that island of yours?" Zuko snorted. "Take off your clothes. How much of this do I have to walk you through?"

He could maybe turn around for that part, but he hasn't.

[boobhat]

"Who'd do the pampering? Vikings don't really do the deferential thing that well. They respect my dad - and me - but you'd be hard-pressed to find a Viking willing to bow down to even another Viking."

Hiccup stripped down and wrapped himself in a towel as well.

[prodigalfirelord]

"That's what you have servants for." Duh.

Zuko made a fair enough show of looking to the side, giving Hiccup a modicum of . . . not privacy, but not being in the spotlight as he undressed. It let him observe a second time without feeling like a complete creep.

He could argue that he was proud of Hiccup coming such a long way from the scrawny, fishbone-kid he'd been, not once, but twice in his weird, timeline-warped life. It wasn't necessarily the strongest argument, but then again, no one was making him have it. He stretched out on his massage table to wait for the masseuse.

[boobhat]

"Yes, and who would those servants be?" Hiccup said with a laugh, not noticing Zuko's surreptitious glances. "I can't just go to the servant store."

He hopped up to sit on the other table with a grin.

[prodigalfirelord]

"Why aren't they lining up at your door? Not everyone can be a soldier. Some people in life were born to be masseuses. Or hold bowls of cherries."

Speaking of masseuses, where were theirs? Zuko wondered as he stretched out on his table, rearranging his tiny towel for modesty that could only be called "adequate."

[boobhat]

Hiccup just started laughing uproariously.

"You're -" He covered his eyes for a moment, trying to get the laughter under control. "You're assuming that my island breeds the kind of people I'd actually want to slather up their hands in oil and rub them all over my back. Not everyone looks like me and Astrid there, Zuko. So my pool of potential servants would include hairy guys named things like 'Sven' and 'Mulch,' some of whom have hooks for hands."

He held up his hand and curled his pointer finger like a hook.

He started laughing again, only it came out as more of a deranged giggle. "But, hey, I'll try the servant thing, okay? And whenever you come visit, you can have a complimentary massage from Crudlug the Crusty. We'll save you the best yak fat oils and he'll try to be very, very careful with his hook."

[prodigalfirelord]

"Or."

And hey, here's a notion.

"I could keep on getting massaged by a pretty woman named Xiang Mei, and you could book her equally pretty apprentice Lin when you come to visit."

Just a thought.

[boobhat]

"No no, you expend all of this generosity and the hospitality of your court on me every time I visit. I owe you the same," Hiccup said generously. "It would be just - just the worst dishonor to not give you that same hospitality back. You should stop by for it at least once, I insist. You know what, no, no, once isn't enough. You should stop by weekly to avail yourself of all the luxuries that Berk has to offer. "

[prodigalfirelord]

"I refuse your insufficient peasant hospitality. When does the war start?"

[boobhat]

"Now."

Hiccup reached over and picked up one of the extra towels, flinging it at Zuko's head.

"A recent economic downturn has left us short of funding for proper artillery."

He threw another towel.

He raised a finger and pointed it at him. "The mighty village of Berk won't take this affront lightly!" he said with fake self-importance. "Dishonor on you! Dishonor on your nation! Dishonor on your cherry bowl holding servants..."

[prodigalfirelord]

"Poor sweet Na Wen had nothing to do with this!" Zuko batted the towels away effortlessly, as their mock-battle was cut short by the masseuses entering the room.

"Sorry for the delay, your Majesty, Lightning Rider - are you ready?"

Zuko, accustomed to the best sort of treatment already, rolled over on his stomach, his modesty towel slipping. He didn't appear to care. "About time."

[boobhat]

"Rude," said Hiccup, and he turned to look at the masseuse walking over to him.

"We are ready," he said politely - and pointedly. "Thank you."

He got ready to lay down, a little more invested in making sure his modesty towel stayed in place. For a moment, he almost had his head in the donut pillow thing - but then he found himself glancing over briefly at Zuko, his eyes drawn by the sight of the towel slipping.

That was a lot of butt. Yep, that was indeed a lot of butt there. Muscular, well-scupted butt that he really should not have been having the urge to keen a glance at, he knew, yet here he was doing it anyway. It was just a darting glance but it was enough to see that very, very nice butt and the hypospray the masseuse was moving towards Zuko's neck -

"Zuko, look out!" he cried out, and in one smooth movement he threw a towel in the face of Zuko's masseuse to temporarily distract her and rolled off his own massage table. His own masseuse still had an outstretched hand holding a hypospray where his own neck had just been.

[prodigalfirelord]

Zuko knew that tone, from years of adventuring, far too well not to leap into action. He twisted, grabbing the masseuse's outstretched arm and locking her from attacking him in return.

"WHO SENT YOU?" he yelled, pressing the woman's face into the mattress, modesty towel uselessly on the ground.

[boobhat]

"Oh gods," said Hiccup. He didn't even have to fight against his masseuse. She was already falling over, a puppet with her strings cut, one side of her body limp. One half of her face was paralyzed.

Zuko would suddenly find the woman he was holding in a pin going limp as well.

Blood started to gush from both of their noses and the situation became immediately clear.

If these were assassins, somebody had just hit the kill switch. If not - which was far more likely - someone had messed with their heads to make them attack them. With possibly fatal results.

Hiccup ran over to the nearest commlink and hit the button for the resort security.

"We need medics in here now!"

[prodigalfirelord]

It was too late by the time the medics stormed in, but the death of the masseuses had made something immediately clear to Hiccup and Zuko.

Someone was on to them, and they were responding with business.

Their body count already up to two civilians, the seasoned spy pair had only to exchange a look between their interviews by local authorities to know what they needed next -

Privacy.

[boobhat]

The Expherience was an attraction that was part of the spa. Floating spheres carried couples in the air over the planet, allowing them to see gorgeous vistas and glorious sunrises and sunsets. The spheres were cushy on the inside, with cushions and pillows everywhere, and while the sphere was clear when you were looking out, it was opaque to anyone on the ground.

That meant the two were able to get their freak on.

The spy freak on, that is. No one would happen on their gear while they were in here.

Various sensors and devices were spread around them as they worked. Hiccup's omnicom was projecting a holodisplay that let him watch the footage he'd jacked from the security systems.

"So far I'm not seeing anything out of the ordinary during the stays of the victims. None of them being dragged into hidden rooms, no masseuses attacking them, nothing. It's all clean."

Too clean.

[prodigalfirelord]

"Someone knows the building very well. Too well. And can disappear from radar. OR they could be using chemical or germ weapons."

Zuko was keeping a physical eye on the premises, pushing cushions aside to look directly down at their birds-eye view of the resort's layout.

"Looking directly at the victims isn't getting us anything, so we need to look at what the victims engaged with. Their food, the water pipes and vents to their rooms, equipment they touched regularly."

The heavy cushions slipped, covering his view, and the Fire Lord himself slipped on the slick, curved surface of the sphere as he tried to fix his view.

[boobhat]

Hiccup kept his eyes on the footage, though the way he suddenly smirked made it clear he was watching Zuko out of the corner of his eye.

"I think it's altered. Easy enough to do. Security's not great. I cracked it and I just used a pre-made cracker. Still, the best way to do that is to recycle footage, and that's harder to do when they're wandering around the place. The only time they would've been making repetitive movements in a way that footage could be cycled is - ayep, there we go, there's where it skips."

It was subtle, but he saw where it looped, as the victim snoozed away.

"Whoever it was, they got them when they were sleeping."

[prodigalfirelord]

"Lemme see that."

Zuko pulled the omnicom screen towards himself, balancing awkwardly on the layers of cushions as he tugged it.

When he'd inspected the loop to his satisfaction, he released it to rearrange the pillows, growling slightly as he stood up, stepping awkwardly across the surface of the sphere to look out the side again.

In the end, walking was annoyingly perilous, so he knelt and leaned against the edge of the sphere. "All right, so they know the security systems, and they can get into any rooms. All signs point to staff."

[boobhat]

"Nah, the systems could've been cracked from the internal feeds - although let me see where the access points are."

He pulled up some schematics.

"Never mind, unless they could climb into the vents, they wouldn't have had a good place to hack into them, so you're probably right on it being staff. That would explain how they got two other staff members - they probably trusted them enough to let them get close. I'm going to look through the profiles of the staff again, see if there are any complaints or disciplinary notices. The GIA gave us all their intelligence profiles, too."

He glanced over at Zuko, kneeling there and trying to look dignified. A wry smile curved at the corners of his mouth.

"In the meantime, you work on that trying-to-have-dignity thing." He looked over at Zuko and made a gesture to show that Zuko should start digging. "You might be able to find it if you look under the cushions there."

[prodigalfirelord]

"You're hilarious."

Zuko's deadpan was not helped as he tried to rise, to stand tall and proud like the lord of a nation he was, proving his dignity still intact, and instead slipped as his foot fell between the seams of a particularly puffy pillow.

With a groan, he went back to trying to dig himself a viewing window.