Work Text:
Every morning, Phainon wakes up at 06:45. He showers, checks on the houseplants lined up along the windowsill, and waters them if they’re looking a little droopy. If it's a weekend, he makes his own breakfast. If it's a weekday, he’ll grab breakfast and coffee on the way to work.
Phainon is lucky that his apartment is located so close to work. His commute is thirty-five minutes if he takes the metro, ninety-five minutes if he cycles, and two hundred and thirty-seven minutes if he walks. He’s been meaning to cycle more frequently for the sake of his fitness, but that would mean waking up an extra hour early.
As he steps out of his apartment building, he sees the mailman making his morning deliveries.
“Good morning, Phainon,” says Phainon.
“Good morning, Phainon,” says Mailman Phainon.
Phainon takes the stack of letters that Mailman Phainon hands him and tucks them in his backpack.
From his apartment building, it’s only half a block to his favourite cafe and another two blocks to the train station. He’s been making an effort to get up earlier in recent days, not because he wants to get to work earlier, but because the cafe keeps running out of his favourite raspberry and white chocolate muffin before he can get there.
There’s already a line of Phainons forming, and Phainon quickens his pace to join it. The barista greets him with a wide smile.
“Good morning, Phainon,” says Phainon.
“Good morning, Phainon,” says Barista Phainon. “The usual today?”
“Yes, please.” Phainon checks out the pastry display and feels a twinge of disappointment when he can’t find the one he’s looking for. “You wouldn’t happen to have any raspberry and white chocolate muffins left, would you?”
“Sorry, Phainon, we just ran out.”
“Ah.” He checks the display again, trying to swallow his disappointment. “Then an apple and walnut muffin, please.”
Barista Phainon winks as he hands it over. “Next time, I’ll set one aside just for you.”
-
Phainon’s real name is Phainon #108642, but nobody calls him that. His friends call him Accountant Phainon, his coworkers call him Water Cooler Phainon, and his fellow deskmates near the water cooler call him Purple Stickynote Phainon (his ex sometimes calls him Phainon #108642, but only when he wants to piss him off). Everyone in this city goes by nicknames, otherwise it'll get a bit confusing living in a city where everyone is Phainon.
Phainonville is the largest city in the world. Some say it’s the only city in the world, but geography isn’t Phainon’s strong suit so he wouldn’t know.
-
He makes it to the station at 07:15 and finds an empty compartment at the back of the train. The compartment isn’t empty for long; two college-aged Phainons stumble onboard just before the doors close and tumble into the seats right opposite him. They’re sharing a set of earphones, taking sips of each others’ boba tea, and, as he watches, one of them leans over to whisper into the other's ear and they both burst into laughter.
Phainon turns away before he can feel jealousy well up inside him. It’s been six months since he and his ex broke up. His coworkers have tried setting him up with other Phainons, but none of them worked out.
He lets his eyes drift back to the college-aged Phainons, at the youth clinging to their faces and the way they cling onto each other. One of them is warming his hands in the other’s hoodie, and the other is sucking up the last of the boba.
Lots of Phainons find themselves in happy fulfilling relationships. Maybe he just hasn’t met the right Phainon yet.
-
Phainon gets into the office at 07:30.
“Morning, Phainon,” his coworkers say.
“Morning, Phainon,” his deskmates say.
“Morning, Phainon,” he responds to them, and stretches his arms before switching on his computer for the day.
His first hour is spent reading emails. His second hour is spent responding to emails. He feels a headache creeping up in the third hour, so he goes into the breakroom for a cup of coffee and somehow bumps into his manager. Manager Phainon drags him into a two-hour conversation about targets and objectives. By the time he extracts himself, most of his coworkers have already gone out for lunch, so he sits at his desk and eats by himself.
The two hours after lunch are spent in back-to-back meetings—one where he clicks through the presentation for Manager Phainon, and one where he sits in the back and tries to not fall asleep. When he returns to his desk, he finds half his inbox deleted and spends another hour arguing with IT until they dispatch someone to help him.
Because of the IT issue, he ends up staying late. He’s the last to leave the office and the last to get off his train. He walks back to his apartment in complete darkness and nearly trips over his neighbour’s cat when it comes to sniff his shoelaces. It’s a fat orange cat, probably breaking records from how overfed it is. He reaches down to pet it, but it flees as soon as his fingers make contact.
-
The rest of the workweek is the same rinse and repeat. He wakes up, goes to work, and sits at the computer for eight hours to get harassed by his manager. Sometimes he goes out for a lunchtime walk but most times he eats at his desk. He comes home and lets his neighbour’s cat circle his ankles two or three times before it goes off to find something more interesting to play with.
On Saturday, he heads out for a jog at the river. It’s a pleasant day—sunny but not too warm—and it seems every other Phainon has the same idea because the river is packed with joggers and cyclists. He jogs for two hours and finds a tree to stand under while he catches his breath. For a moment, he allows himself to enjoy the fresh air, the chatter of joggers around him, the sunlight bouncing off the surface of the river, letting it wash away all the misery from work.
Then he sees him, his ex-Phainon, hand-in-hand with another Phainon.
They’re watching a mother duck with her ducklings, laughing, leaning against each other, their faces flushed rosy pink with the early hours of the morning.
“I’ll be flying back and forth all the time, I might not have time for a relationship. You should find someone who isn't a pilot.”
What a load of crockshit.
-
He doesn’t go out on Sunday.
-
On Monday, he’s back at work.
“You’re looking a little tired today,” says Barista Phainon. “Want me to give you an extra shot?”
He reads emails, writes emails, reschedules a bunch of meetings, and cancels a bunch of meetings his manager keeps adding to his calendar. He agrees to grab lunch with a coworker, North Window Phainon, at a noodle shop across the street from their office. They both order enormous bowls of noodles (beef and tomato for Phainon and chicken and celery for North Window Phainon), and try to eat as fast as their thirty-minute lunch break allows them.
“Have you ever wondered if this is all there is?”
North Window Phainon stares back at him with a mouthful of noodles.
“I mean, this job is fine, my pay is fine, I know I’m lucky to be working here instead of, you know…” He gestures vaguely at a Delivery Phainon who is arguing with the noodle shop owner. “I’m just wondering, what if we do something different with our lives? What if we leave this city?
North Window Phainon swallows his mouthful of noodles. “Leave? Why would you want to leave? This is the greatest city in the world!”
“I know, but, don’t you think there could be more out there? Don’t you feel like there's something we're missing?”
North Window Phainon sighs. “I know what’s going on,” he says, pointing his chopsticks at Phainon. “You’re under too much pressure. Maybe we should we give you more support, or find you an assistant. Maybe weekly catch-up sessions to make sure you’re on top of things?”
Phainon deflates. “Never mind.”
After lunch, Manager Phainon stops by his desk to chat to him. He props his ‘Best Boss’ mug against Phainon’s desk, leaving a ring of coffee on some fairly important documents that Phainon just printed out, and starts asking why he's cancelling his calendar invites.
Phainon can feel a headache coming on again, pressing into the back of his eyes and the sides of his head. Maybe Barista Phainon did slip him an extra shot of coffee this morning. He closes his eyes, feeling pinpricks of pain stab into his eyelids, wondering if he should just call it a day and head home.
“Phainon, hey, Phainon.”
He feels a 'Best Boss' mug resting on his shoulder.
"Phainon, are you listening to me?”
The ‘Best Boss’ mug explodes.
Manager Phainon splutters, suddenly finding himself clutching a handful of ceramic shards. “What—?”
Phainon’s computer screen explodes.
One by one, the windows along the side of the office explode, showering glass all over the desks and floors. His coworkers scream and duck under their desks and his manager stumbles onto his knees.
Phainon slowly gets up, ignoring the horrified stares of everyone else in the office.
“I would like to go home now,” he says.
-
They do not let him go home. They call for an ambulance to take him to the hospital, and despite his assurances that it won’t happen again, the paramedics in the ambulance strap him down and inject him with something that makes colours dance in front of his eyes.
Two hours later, he finds himself sitting across from a bespectacled doctor.
“Have you ever heard of Coronal Radiance?” Doctor Phainon asks him.
Phainon shakes his head slowly. He’s still a little out of it from whatever they injected him with, and his vision of Doctor Phainon is occasionally doubling up.
“It’s a rare condition, that few have heard of until they are diagnosed with it. After a diagnosis is made, it's impossible to know how it will progress. I’m afraid our only solution is to get you to see a therapist.”
“My ex wanted me to see a therapist,” says Phainon.
Doctor Phainon sighs.
Phainon realises he’s brought up his ex unprompted multiple times during the consultation. He hopes Doctor Phainon doesn’t think he isn't over his ex.
“This is different,” says Doctor Phainon. “This one’s a specialist, and he’s so high in demand, the waiting time is over a hundred years.”
What?
Doctor Phainon turns away and starts tapping at his keyboard as Phainon attempts to blink away the colourful confetti that appeared in his eyes again.
“You’re lucky your situation is so dire," he says. "Let’s see if I can pull a few strings and let you jump the queue.”
-
After twelve days of mandated medical leave, unanswered phone calls from his coworkers, and unsuccessful attempts to make things explode with his mind again, a driver arrives at his apartment to pick him up and take him to the specialist. The car is sleek and discreet, its windows blacked out, and the driver is unexpectedly chatty.
“Man, you’re so lucky,” says Driver Phainon. “I’ve had my application rejected four times already. Maybe I should get myself diagnosed with Coronal Radiance.”
Phainon smiles awkwardly at him from the rear-view mirror. “Have you met them before?”
“No, but my partner has. Maybe thirty years ago? He managed to get in through the lottery system. A real lucky guy.”
Phainon’s eyes catch the plain-banded ring on his hand resting against the driver's wheel. “You’re married?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Four years! But we’ve been dating for over twenty years; it took him ages to pop the question.”
Something squeezes inside Phainon’s chest. He turns to the side before Driver Phainon can see the misery that’s probably on his face.
“Seems like an incredibly lucky guy,” says Phainon.
When they arrive at the specialist’s clinic, Driver Phainon waves him off enthusiastically and hands him over to a security guard. The security guard gives him the most invasive pat-down he has experienced in his life and asks him to empty out his backpack onto a conveyor belt.
“Oh, I’m reading the same book,” says Security Guard Phainon. “The author really captures what it means to be Phainon.”
Phainon’s keys, phone, and wristwatch are confiscated, and he’s left with an empty backpack and the book. He’s escorted into an administrative area, where a tired-looking Receptionist Phainon hands him a stack of paperwork to fill out. Phainon is normally pretty good with paper, it being the bulk of his job and all, but even his wrist starts cramping after the second hour and the third stack of paperwork.
Allergies, sexual history, turn-ons, and turn-offs.
What kind of specialist is this?
“Your session lasts fifty minutes," Receptionist Phainon explains to him. "You will wait until your name is called, and you have fifty minutes starting from when your name is called. Make sure you finish within the time limit, or it'll be a permanent mark on your criminal record.”
“Are you serious?”
He’s escorted by Security Guard Phainon to a long hallway with a door at the end. There are chairs along the wall in front of the door, and Phainon sits in the chair closest to the door. At the ten-minute mark, a Phainon is escorted into the hallway. He sits in the chair to the right of Phainon and pulls out a book. Phainon takes a quick side-glance—it’s the same as the one in his backpack. At the twenty-minute mark, another Phainon is escorted into the hallway. He sits in the next chair over and starts tapping a rhythm on his leg. Maybe he’s a concert pianist or something.
At the thirty-minute mark, his name is called.
Phainon #108642.
“Good luck, Phainon,” says the Phainon on his immediate right.
Phainon nods.
When he pushes open the door, he sees a man.
The man is definitely not Phainon.
“Hello,” says Phainon.
“Hello,” says not-Phainon. “You may call me Mydei.”
The man is handsome in a wild sort of way, like a lion lounging at an office desk. His shirt is unbuttoned to his sternum, his sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, he has red tattoos on his throat and forearms, and he isn’t wearing any pants.
Phainon does a double-take from the doorway.
The man is definitely not wearing any pants. His legs are, aside from the tattoos, completely bare.
“What are you standing around for?” the man asks.
“Why aren’t you wearing pants?”
The man makes an irritated noise and folds his arms. “Because I didn’t have time to put them on. Can we start?”
Phainon slowly crosses the room and seats himself across from the man.
Mydei. The man’s name is Mydei.
Mydei has golden hair and golden eyes. He has broad shoulders and well-built arms. His nose is elegantly-shaped and looks like it has been broken more than once before.
He is not Phainon.
“Phainon?”
“Hello, yes, I’m Phainon.” Phainon clenches his hands that have suddenly become sweaty.
“I know.”
Mydei flips through a folder on his desk.
There are a lot of folders on the desk. How many patients has he seen today? Come to think of it, he does look a little tired; there are bags under his lion-like eyes and a slight slump to his magnificent shoulders.
“Phainon #108642, correct?”
Phainon nods.
“It says here you’re an accountant?” says Mydei. “I can't i. No wonder you lost it.”
“Excuse me?”
“And it says here you broke up with your boyfriend of thirty years…around six months ago? Pretty long relationship to end. Why didn't you get married?"
Phainon feels his face flush. He looks down and somehow ends up staring at Mydei’s tattooed cleavage.
“I don’t want to talk about my ex,” he says.
“The doctor that referred you said you wouldn’t shut up about your ex.”
“I just…I don’t think it’s relevant.”
Mydei slams the folder shut. “Okay, Phainon, tell me how you ended up with Coronal Radiance then.”
Phainon looks up into his golden eyes and shrinks from the intensity of his stare. How is he supposed to know? Isn’t Mydei supposed to be the specialist here?
“I can make things explode with my mind,” he says, his voice sounding small even to his own ears.
“Really? Show me then.”
He stares at a pencil holder on Mydei’s desk and concentrates. He thinks about days in the office looking at spreadsheets, he thinks about Manager Phainon inviting him home to check out his three-monitor setup, he thinks about his ex walking hand-in-hand with the other Phainon. He thinks about Mydei, with his bare legs folded under the desk, barely inches away from Phainon’s own.
Nothing happens.
“Incredible,” says Mydei. "What a remarkable gift."
How rude. He might be the rudest man Phainon has ever met. Even his ex, who knew the exact words to hurt him, would still dress his words up in gentleness.
Just as he is about to put his thoughts into words and tell Mydei how rude he is, he hears a soft ‘plink’, like something dripping onto the tiled floor.
“What was that?”
Mydei flushes and snaps his legs together. “Nothing.”
Plink.
There it is again.
Phainon starts looking around the room but Mydei clears his throat to get his attention again.
“Coronal Radiance is not driven by anger or frustration, but dissatisfaction," he says. "Wanting more than you already have, yearning for something that doesn’t exist, thinking that something else is out there even though nothing awaits them. It only affects those that are completely miserable, those that have so little to live for that they dream of possibilities beyond reality.”
“I see,” says Phainon.
“So the only solution,” says Mydei, “is to become satisfied with your life.”
“That’s it?”
“Do you have any friends, Phainon?”
“I have some friends at work.”
“Do you have any friends you don’t work with?”
Phainon opens his mouth and closes it. Most of his friends were his ex’s friends, and they all sided with his ex after the break-up.
“Do you have anyone you can talk to? Anyone who can relieve your dissatisfactions instead of letting them build up inside you?”
Phainon can feel a buzzing beneath his skin. It’s not the kind of buzzing he gets around Manager Phainon that tells him to leave the vicinity as quickly as possible; this one makes his heart beat faster and his hands go sweaty, and makes him want to do something wild, like grab Mydei by his half-unbuttoned shirt and haul him across the desk.
Plink.
“Can you hear that? I can’t be the only one hears that.”
“Concentrate, Phainon,” says Mydei. “If you keep holding it in, you might release it unintentionally from time to time, like you did at the office. Or you might hold it in so much, you explode.”
What. “Will I die?”
Mydei gives him a strange look. “You won’t die, but you might explode.”
Plink.
“Sorry, that’s really distracting. Is there a leak somewhere?”
Ignoring Mydei’s protests, Phainon stands up and begins searching around the room.
Plink.
It’s not coming from the air conditioning, it’s not coming from the walls. In fact, the further he walks into the room, the quieter the sound becomes.
“Sit down, Phainon #108642.”
“Just a moment.”
Plink.
It’s coming from Mydei’s chair. There is a puddle forming under his chair: white-ish in colour and slowly expanding in size.
But, strange. Looking at the ceiling above Mydei, there don’t appear to be any leaks. Phainon grabs onto Mydei’s chair and starts dragging it away from the puddle.
Plink.
The dripping isn’t coming from the ceiling or the chair; it’s coming from Mydei. Mydei is leaking all over his chair and onto the floor.
Phainon isn’t an expert or anything, but this seems a little unprofessional.
“Phainon #108642! Can you wait until we finish talking?”
He ignores Mydei and pushes him against the desk, wedging himself between his thighs to keep them apart. They are very nice thighs, very thick and muscular, and a little bruised up by the looks of it. Does he play a high contact sport, like football or hockey? His shirt is hiding all the important parts, and the source of the dripping noise, so Phainon lifts it out of the way.
Mydei makes a move to stop him but Phainon grabs both his hands and pins them to the desk. He turns his attention back to Mydei’s cock that was hiding behind his shirt.
It’s a nice cock—a decent size and shape—a little worn out. It can’t be where the drips are coming from.
“Phainon, wait!”
Phainon lets go of his hands to lift up his thighs.
There, behind the cock, is a loose, wet hole.
Immediately, Mydei gives up on fighting. He slumps back against the desk and sighs. His thighs hang heavy in Phainon’s arms and his chest rapidly rises and falls as he tries to catch his breath.
“May I?” says Phainon.
“Go ahead.” Mydei’s voice sounds resigned.
It’s a pretty hole, a pretty pink in colour, and the way it flutters open and shut reminds Phainon of a flower. Every time it opens, it spits out a little globule of cum that lands on the chair and drips onto the floor. Phainon wants to chew it around his mouth like candy.
He leans forward and licks it.
“Don’t do that!” Mydei's leg jerks, nearly clipping Phainon in the side of his head. “It’s dirty!”
Phainon ignores him and licks it again. There’s so much cum, it can’t possibly belong to one person. When he sticks his tongue inside, all he can taste is warm, salty cum.
“How many?” he asks.
“Ah?”
Phainon pushes two fingers inside and spreads them. He barely feels any resistance.
“How many did you have before me? It looks like a lot.”
“I’m meant to be cleaned up in between clients, but the previous client was–ah–running late.”
“And the clients before that?” Phainon asks, watching cum spill out between his fingers.
Mydei does not respond.
Phainon grows bored of fingering Mydei. It’s not like Mydei needs any preparation; his hole is already so loose that Phainon could fit a fist in there without hesitation. He pulls back his hand, wipes his fingers on Mydei’s thigh, and starts unbuckling his belt.
“Before we do this,” says Phainon, “is this a normal part of the service?”
Mydei sighs and nods.
That’s all the consent Phainon needs. He drags Mydei’s hips up off the chair and pushes inside.
Like he expects, it’s loose. It’s gaping around him. It’s barely giving him any sensation, but Mydei’s flushed face and gorgeous body are enough to keep him hard.
“Does it hurt?” he asks.
“No.”
Plink. Plink. More droplets of cum spill out.
“How does it feel?”
“Feels good–ahh, it feels good.”
It looks good. Mydei’s chest is heaving with each thrust, and the buttons on his shirt are straining like they're about to pop off. Phainon does him a favour and rips open his shirt.
“Wha–ahh!”
His torso is as gloriously muscled as his thighs, covered in bright red tattoos and purpling bite marks. There are bruises on his chest, his stomach, and his hips. Both his nipples are so swollen and pinched out of shape that it hurts Phainon just looking at them.
He leans down and takes a nipple in his mouth, rubbing it with his tongue, grinding it between his teeth. Mydei moans and arches into him.
“How many have you had?” he demands as soon as he spits out the nipple. “Hundreds? Thousands? Millions?”
Mydei shakes his head.
Phainon can feel himself getting close. He grabs Mydei’s thighs and jackhammers as hard as he can go, coming with a low groan inside Mydei.
The cum immediately starts spilling out from where Mydei is gaping around his dick. It should be disgusting, but he can’t bring himself to care. Not Mydei's body warm in his arms, not with the way Mydei’s looking at him with adoring eyes and flushed cheeks. Like he’s the only Phainon in the world.
“I’m so sorry, that was selfish of me,” says Phainon. “Let me help you with that.”
He grabs Mydei’s dick and tries to stroke it, but it remains stubbornly soft in his hands. Given how many patients he’s seen today (this week? this month?), he probably doesn’t have it in him to orgasm any more.
“It’s fine,” says Mydei.
He turns around and bends himself over with his elbows on the desk.
“You can do it again if you want.”
Phainon doesn’t need to be told twice. As soon as he hardens, he grabs Mydei’s hips and starts thrusting again. This position is a little better than the other one. He can actually feel his cock sliding against Mydei’s walls this time.
“Yes, yes, yes,” Mydei moans, pressing his face into his arms.
His shirt is fluttering uselessly around his shoulders, so Phainon does him another favour and rips it off. His back is covered in bruises as well, ranging from mottled purple to yellow-green in colour. Bruises in the shape of hands, bruises in the shape of teeth, and even what looks like whiplashes just below his shoulder-blades. Phainon squeezes a particularly vicious one on his waist just to feel him shudder.
“You’ve had so many,” Phainon sighs, "I bet you can’t even keep track. Which one am I?”
When Mydei does not respond, he gently slaps Mydei’s face.
“Who am I?”
Mydei’s eyes flutter open. “One…oh–ohhh!”
His hips jerk back to meet Phainon’s thrusts.
“What was that?”
“One…oh…e–eight…six…” he sobs and buries his face in his arms again.
“Tsk.”
Over the next half hour, Phainon barely recognises himself.
He takes Mydei against the desk, against the walls, on the floor. He takes Mydei’s ass, his mouth, his hands, and even makes Mydei lie flat on the desk while he thrusts his cock between those glorious tits.
Mydei is nothing but obliging. A true professional. The way he clings to and kisses Phainon as if he will disappear the next second.
When the fifty minutes are up, Phainon jerks off one last time on Mydei’s face and leaves him panting and shuddering in his chair.
The door on the other side of the room opens and Security Guard Phainon walks in.
“Damn,” he says , letting out a low whistle. “Ready to leave?”
Phainon nods. “Ready.”
He bends down and kisses Mydei, tasting himself on Mydei’s lips and probably tasting all the Phainons before him.
“I hope we’ll see each other again,” he says sincerely.
Mydei mumbles something in acquiescence.
-
Phainon wakes up at 06:45 feeling like the weight of the world has been lifted off his shoulders. He hums as he waters his pot-plants, he sings as he washes his hair, he picks up his neighbour’s cat when it comes wandering over and smothers his face in its fur.
“Good morning, Phainon,” says Barista Phainon. “You’re looking a lot better today.”
“I’m feeling a lot better today!” Phainon exclaims.
He leans down to examine the selection of muffins in the cabinet. They all look so wonderful, he can’t decide which one he wants.
“The usual?”
“Yes, please! And also a muffin. Any muffin. You decide!”
When he comes to up his order from the counter, there’s a phone number scrawled on the side of his cup, along with a winky face and ‘PAHINON #823156 CALL ME’.
Smiling, he takes his coffee and muffin and sets out on his day.
What a beautiful day in Phainonville.
-
Admin Notes
There appears to be a pattern in Irontomb’s cognition: periods of high-frequency activity followed by periods of low-frequency activity. These patterns seem synonymous to a human sleep cycle, repeatedly alternating between rapid eye movement stages and non-rapid eye movement stages.
Recently, periods of high-frequency activity have become associated with feelings of anxiety, distress, and elation.
It is possible Irontomb is experiencing nightmares.