Knights Apocalyptica

Chapter 261: Best Man Things

“Three bottles down; c’mon! Number four!” The Pendragon clapped Colin on his back, starting a chant of "Four, Four, Four" from the rest of the men and women.

Colin swayed; his bleary eyes met Erec’s.

Erec gave him a thumbs-up. But watched with care; when was too much? And when should he stop his friend?

Colin hiccuped, brought the bottle to his mouth, and downed it in a single gulp. The crowd erupted in a yell, the clapping like a beat of drums. So loud that for a second, it drowned out the sound of all the other music blasting. With a belch, Colin threw his bottle, and his arms went up with a triumphant yell; Erec shook his head. Four hadn’t hit the limit. But eventually they would.

What had started as a small group of Pendragon boys joining their bachelor party had morphed into something that would have the Knights yelling at them. At first, it had just been Pendragons, then other nomad Packs drove in as well, pulling their cars together in circles and blasting the same music. Then came the people from the Kingdom. Nearly all of them were the same age—young men and women, here to tear the wasteland up. And, soon, those same people would be getting Colin his fifth drink. Then probably a sixth.

Really, when should Garin or Erec step in?

And amid it all, Colin only got sloppier; he accepted another beer a guy with bleached hair handed him. Five.

Erec raised a weary eyebrow at Garin. His friend ignored the gesture and instead slipped over to Colin, clapping him on the back and toasting with his own beer as the music boomed louder; Colin clambered to the top of a car and danced, shortly joined by several others. Erec watched with a tense feeling in his shoulders; would they fall off? Garin decided not to cut him off…

But maybe…

Erec moved to join them, holding his own swishing beer, when a delicate hand caught him by the shoulder."What brings a big guy like you somewhere like this?"

Erec pivoted, and in front of him was the person his heart had been missing all day; Enide stood, a big old grin on her face, and wearing what was, for her, a rather demure blue and far more Kingdom-style dress than he was used to seeing her in. She wore it differently, too. Gone was the jewelry that accentuated the nobility of the dress, and in its place was a laser rifle strapped straight to her back. She set a hand on his cheek, and her smile only grew at his reaction.

"You like it?" She did a small twirl.

"It looks good, but I'll always prefer you in the road leathers." Erec gave a snort.

A car revved near them, making Enide smirk and stare at it—and instantly, they were splashed with run-off beer from a guy waterfalling a keg on the top of a truck while three women clapped and a mammoth-built man yelled at him to keep going. In the bed of that same truck, a man and woman were making out, oblivious to the show mere feet away from them.

“This is nothing like the noble courts,” Erec commented as Enide tore her eyes away.

"I can't believe you didn't grow up with this! Jeez. Every time we go to a noble function, I keep wondering how you guys do it. Is the wedding going to be like that? I can’t even imagine. Why make your parties so boring?”

"Every place has its traditions. I doubt that even Vega can throw a party like this," Erec remarked.

“Er… I don’t know. We know what we’re doing, but they've got their own long-held traditions to uphold.”

She grabbed his hand and pulled him away; Erec gave a last glance at Colin. He was in good hands, as Garin was at his side. It was fine to take time and enjoy the party; they walked through the crowds, past a sea of smiles, and the future faded away. Nobody cared about tomorrow. The whole lot was a bubble of time, one stained by the smell of gasoline and a ringing deep in their ears as the booming music hammered into their chests.

On top of one car was a man, his face to the sky above, an electric guitar blaring out a solo as he riffed over the currently playing old-world music.

“Gotta say I’m jealous. This is a whole lot better than whatever the hell a bridal shower is,” Enide shouted, her voice barely audible above the crowd.

“Garin’s idea. I really did think we were going to sit around shooting bottles today. Colin needed to feel better, and that would fluff up his ego, especially when I missed my shots.”

Enide raised an eyebrow. “You, shoot a gun? I have something else in mind that we can get up to, but I’m interested to see that.”

“I was going to toss my axe, we can still find a patch of wasteland to try,” Erec admitted.

“Hah. The alone time sounds nice… but that’s not what I had in mind. Besides, you’d never hit a target that far with an axe.” The music roared louder the farther they went; she winced.

"You alright? Is the music too much?" He tried to stop and check on her, but she pulled him along with a shake of her head.

“No, not the music. Just some intrusive thoughts. Come on. Let’s dance. I didn’t come here ahead of everyone else just to sit around. I came to have fun with my boyfriend before things kicked off.”

Ahead of everyone else?

Erec didn’t get to ask, as she pulled him even faster into the deepest part of the party; along the way, she had a magical knack for getting booze into both of their hands. She chugged hers, so he chugged his, and then she had more. The crowd swelled, going shoulder to shoulder as they reached the central ring of cars that made for the main dance floor. Every car here was hooked up to speakers, the beat of the drum so loud it hammered his body before he heard it.

And, like that, without his mind processing, he moved. Dancing to the hyperfrenetic beat of the desert party, his muscles tugged by the sound waves like a puppet.

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Enide, though, moved as if she belonged here; her grace parted the dense crowd, pulling them into the thicket of bodies. The sweat and heat coated them, the atmosphere heavy as they moved along with everyone else, as they yelled with everyone else. On the occasional beat drop, people jumped up and down with a zeal that turned them from individuals to a swaying, multi-limbed collective.

All the while, Erec only had eyes for the lithe woman in front of him.

She didn’t stop.

Others left the dance floor, coated in sweat, needing to cool off and take in a deep gasp of air and a mouthful of water. Enide didn’t; she only brightened, her dancing picking up the pace to make up for those who left. And as she looked back at Erec, a challenge lived in her eyes.

Can you keep up?

Fury simmered. Not in the hateful, bloody way it normally did, but in the competitive spirit that his Knighthood had begun with; she made him smolder, like she always did.

His body picked up the pace, his muscles taut, his motions growing more fluid, matching hers.

They circled, pulling apart, then close. Their breath hot against one another, the sweat between them a sheen that caught the light of the cars and sparkled; she drew in closer, one hand going to his neck, the other pulling her body as close to his as she could. The heat off her was an inferno matching his own; her grin sparked a whole different round of fire in him. She was life, and this was a heaven of its own.

Erec gazed down at her, meeting her wild eyes.

He fell in love.

Not for the first time. But he fell in love again. A hundred thousand times, he’d fallen in love with this woman; that was love. Every second in her company was yet another opportunity to fall deeper; Erec had the fortune of being able to have that moment so many times, countless centuries.

It never got stale; his breath caught, his heart burned.

Enide paused, hovering. A shadow crossed her eyes under the weight of that burning emotion.

Oh, how he wished to tell her.

He moved to say something, but paused.

No. The vow.

A vow of many lifetimes. It has to unravel naturally. He stopped, hanging in the balance. It was never easy; he’d wished she’d awoken first.

Enide shivered, then smiled even wider, before standing on her tiptoes. She kissed him. Her lips on his were a cold shock that broke the system, cut through the heat; it was made worse by the way she pressed into him, making him never want to let her go. To freeze together in an embrace.

The second stretched to infinity, until suddenly a drunk man stumbled into them and broke the spell.

Enide stepped back, taking in a deep gulp of air. She looked left, looked right, and then dragged him off the dance floor, putting her ability to navigate the dense crowd to good use, clearing them out of the heat, sounds, and bodies all around them.

She only stopped when they were clear of the worst of the party and found an abandoned rusty-red truck. She pulled him into the bed of the truck and started shamelessly downing the water she’d gotten along the way. After finishing it and moving on to a beer, she finally sat back and stared up at the sky, a silly smile on her face.

"Better than in Vega. Your dance moves have gotten better. Did you guess that’s what I wanted?" she said.

“Glad to impress you. That hadn’t been my guess, though.” Erec said. He gestured for the beer, and she handed it over. He took a long chug, then paused, staring at it. He swirled the amber liquid, letting the heat settle in his chest. “This isn’t really great for rehydration, is it?”

“It’s a night to get drunk. Besides, you're a big man. When you wanna get a cup of water later, you'll find it. And being a little buzzed sets the mood for the show."

Right. He’d wanted to ask, but got distracted by her.

Erec frowned. "What did you mean by 'before things kicked off'?"

Enide gestured to the party around her. "Listen, I know you lot have your traditions. But damn, the bridal shower was boring. And I thought about it. That wasn’t just because I wasn’t used to it. I’d like to think I know Alexandra a bit by now. That sort of stuffy dress-trying thing? Tea? Snacks? The wine was okay, but that’s not the type of girl she is. After the dress, she was fighting yawns the whole evening. So I invited her and everyone else… since I had some apologies to make."

Erec processed that.

"Colin is wasted," he warned.

Enide held her smile. “That’s good. She’s going to get wasted, too. With all this shit hitting them like a ton of bricks, did you notice? They haven’t even seen each other since their sudden wedding announcement. Can you imagine? Not even having the chance to sit down and talk about it? Fucking crazy. This will be good for them, or, if it isn’t, then they can get real and deal with it before she walks down the aisle in her pretty dress.”

Erec stared at her in both admiration and horror; Enide had invited a gaggle of the highest-class women from the Kingdom to a party like this. Worse, she’d invited Alexandria to see her husband, no doubt drunk off his ass.

Goddess only knew what would happen.

Enide stopped. A small spider made of light was on her arm; she stared at it. That was Olivia's spider—it had been a long while since he'd seen it. “Oh, that’s the signal.” She leapt up from the bed of the truck onto the cab, and pointed in a direction. “That’s them. The show’s about to start.”

Erec got up and searched. They stood out like a fire in the middle of a desert; a small group of very high-class noble women was breaking into the edge of the party, dolled up in the finest of dresses. At the head was a woman with a shock of red hair, wearing a decidedly less fancy garment than her company; next to her was Olivia, also wearing a dressed-down version of typical courtly fashion. It made them fit in more, though the rest of the group counteracted that, catching a lot of stares from the others.

"It's been fun, Hero. We’ll see each other soon. I gotta help. The rest of the girls might need a little encouragement, and it’ll earn me some bonus points. I just wanted to steal some time with you for myself before the party got rolling. Find Colin. It’ll be more dramatic that way.”

Enide hopped off the top of the truck, and rushed through the crowd, skittering away like an animal in its natural habitat to join the bride's party.

Erec stared at her back and sighed.

Part of him wished the dancing had never ended; it was a war to tear himself from her. But he did it, he hopped off the truck and cut through the crowd.

Eventually, he found what he was looking for. It didn’t take long. Colin was, after all, the centerpiece of the party and was oddly relishing the attention. In a normal social gathering, he was the type to sit in a corner nursing a drink. Now, he was still dancing on the hood of yet another car, a fat squirrel bobbing on his head, while a coyote ran circles around the vehicle and dived in and out of the surrounding crowd of Pendragons. Garin was right there next to him; Garin's sloppy steps and cheering told Erec everything he needed to know.

Out of everywhere in the party, this group was the drunkest of the lot, and even approaching it curled Erec's nose with the smell of whiskey and beer.

Somewhere in the distance, the bride and her party were making their way in. They had some time. Alexandra would want to drink, the girls would want to dance, but eventually, inevitably, they would find Colin.

Erec rolled his shoulders.

It was time to prove why he was the best man.