asher_talos | [For Stephen & Danica

Most people looked forward to their birthdays, but Asher wasn't most people. Technically, he'd only been a person for a little over two years now, so at least he had a good reason to go against what he considered to be the majority rule.

To him, all birthdays did now was remind him that he was disgustingly mortal, that he was that much closer to death after five centuries of avoiding it so well. He couldn't understand why people celebrated something like that. But, then, Asher still didn't understand a lot about how humans worked. He was okay with that, though.

Whatever the case, Asher was perfectly content ignoring that there was anything even remotely different about the day. There was no rule stating he had to acknowledge it. As far as he was concerned, it was just a normal day.

He reentered the compound after returning from feeding and watering Beau, just like he would any other day. He was smart enough to avoid the rec room, though, because chances were that the jukebox wouldn't have gotten the Ordinary Day memo, and he wasn't going to be held responsible for what he did to it if it started playing Happy Birthday.

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"I'm not doing anything." Which was most likely the problem, but he didn't really care.

"Aha!" Stephen exclaimed, pointing. "So you admit it!"

"How keen are you on keeping that finger" Asher asked, head tilting curiously to one side.

"...It's an important finger." He used it a lot.

He brought his hand back, just in case, and sighed heavily. And sadly. Dramatically, one might say.

"Can you please just open it?"

There. He didn't sound demanding or loud at all.

"Well if you're going to whine about it." Asher said, reaching out to pull the present back toward him. A small part of him had to wonder if this was normal. Was accepting gifts usually like pulling teeth with other people?

Probably not.

He blamed Stephen. If he hadn't given it to him in the first place then all of this could have easily been avoided. So, by that logic, all his fault.

"There. I opened it." Asher stared at it for a moment before looking back at Stephen. "What the fuck is it?"

The newly formed smile fell from Stephen's face at Asher's question. It quickly turned into a scowl, because what the hell? It was obvious what it was!

"It's the audiobook version of my book!" He tapped a finger on the top of it and beamed again. "Plus there's a compass I found, for your boat."

But that was nothing compared to the gift of Stephen's Word! He had lucked out when the bookshelf had given it to him.

"The one I read?" And he'd heard being read to his horse, of all things, by Stephen himself. He was expected to suffer through it again? As luck would have it, though, Asher didn't have anything to play it on. "...I'll cherish it forever."

He'd stuff it in his sock drawer and forget all about it.

The compass was actually sort of neat, and Asher spent a few seconds swiveling it around and watching the arrow move. Unfortunately, it wasn't as neat as Jack Sparrow's, in that it seemed to work properly instead of pointing to whatever he wanted most. He was almost positive that he didn't want the fucking bowl of fruit on the table.

"Thanks. Again."

Any insincerity on Asher's part flew riiiight on over Stephen's head. The huge smile stayed firmly in place, and he sounded almost insanely cheerful when he said, "You are welcome."

In his mind, he couldn't have chosen a better gift.

[For Stephen & Danica - Dated to August 4th]

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