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It had been several months since his short-lived courtship with Pedro Pascal ended abruptly. Now, Nic Cage sat at a dive bar in Pennsylvania while shooting Willy’s Wonderland 2. Nic didn’t have any lines, so he spent his nights commenting on the news in hopes that someone would strike up a conversation with him. “Fuck Yeah, Fetterman won!” A leather jacket clad figure strode up behind him and removed his sunglasses. He folded his arms and announced, “I bet I could beat him in a fight”.
“Oh yeah? Says who?”
The stranger produced a roll of paper, signed it, and presented it to Nic. “The name’s Johnny Cage. I do all my own stunts.”
Nic gave him a look over. Jeans and a black jacket. With the dim light of the bar, they could have been twins if not for Johnny’s blond hair. “So do I, buckaroo. The name’s Nic, without the K. Come have a seat, mi amigo.”
Johnny sat down next to Nic. His bulging arms pressed against the National Treasure. “Is this toilet paper?” Nic said, holding up Johnny’s autograph.
“So what brings the greatest actor of the 21st century out to Nowhere, Pennsylvania?”
Nic took a swallow of his Aberlour scotch before starting carefully. “Don’t tell the National Enquirer this, but it turns out the dinosaur skeleton- while actually a set of fossils. You see it’s really interesting that the T-rexes you see in museums aren’t the actual dinosaur, but over millions of years- the bones were replaced with rock-“
As Nic’s hands animated basic paleontology, Johnny held up a hand. “Skip the science lesson”
“All right then, anyways, last September I was at this auction in Kuala Lumpur with these guys in turbans and I won this complete set of some distant cousin of a T-rex. I order it to be shipped back to the US. A week later I get a call from Interpol. Turns out the fossil was illegally obtained and they’re willing to drop the case against me buying it if I don’t contest them seizing the Malaysians’ bank accounts. I’m out 50 mil and now I’m starring in a sequel of a video-game pseudo adaptation whose script I found on the blood list. Have you ever played Five Nights at Freddys? My son Kal-El loves it. He’s super great, but I haven’t the time to check it out.”
“Can’t say that I have, Mr Cage. What do you say we take this conversation out to my car and fuck each other’s brains out?”
Nic pondered. He hadn’t had much experience with men, other than that one selfcest incident that caused his wife to leave him. But goddamn if that kiss wasn’t the best moment of his life… so far.
“Let’s do it in my car instead. Ever been inside a Lamborghini Diablo?”
Johnny slammed his hand playfully, yet far too forcefully, into Nic’s back. “I own four of them, my friend.”
Nic got up from his seat and slid a credit card to the bartender. The platinum card bore a stylized engraving of his initials. He left his hand on the bar, tapping away with his finger. With his other hand he fumbled for his pocketed key fob and aimed it at a window. A cherry red sports car chirped in the parking lot. Nic received his card. Knowing the imported scotch he had been drinking over the course of the evening, the bill probably approached a hundred dollars, but he was glad Johnny was there to curb his spending.
Holding each other’s waists, the two stumbled out to the Italian made masterpiece. They sat down next to each other in the back with a small seat between them. Nervous, Nic began fidgeting with the door handle to his left and softly slapping his thigh with his other hand. Meanwhile, Johnny snorted a line of coke. “Oh yeah,” he muttered to himself.
Nic turned to his guest, “Did you just do a line of cocaine in my fucking car?”
“It gets me ready for fights and fun times. The best blowjobs are received while high.”
Nick shook his head and then froze. “You thought I was going to blow you?”
“Yeah, what? Did you expect me to put your dick in my mouth?”
“I’m the goddamn Ghost Rider!” Nic said, pointing to himself.
Johnny did likewise. “I do my own stunts, asshole!”
“So does Tom Cruise and he’s a fucking scientologist!”
*This fictitious Nic Cage would like the readers of this fic to know that he has nothing against scientologists as his good friend John Travolta was one
“Did Tom Cruise ever fight a shapeshifting dinosaur man in a deathmatch for the fate of earth?”
Nicolas Cage took a breath and returned to Johnny with eyes as cold as steel.
“You’re not even real.”
Johnny uncharacteristically kept his mouth shut for a moment instead of immediately firing back.
“Neither is this situation. We’re a video game character and a dramatized version of a Hollywood actor written into a scenario that exists because of a longstanding erasure of gay men in pop culture. Neither of us are gay, but the search for representation long denied has a jumping at shadows. We should not be mad at each other (although our feelings are merely inventions of the author), but instead should rage against a society in which we are just another drop in the ocean. Try as we might, there is nothing we can do to bring us the relief we truly need.”
Nic and Johnny stared at each other for an unspecified amount, chewing on that morsel of philosophy. They also couldn’t decide who would be bottoming whom.
Nic pressed a button on the console in front of them and two cup holders slid towards them. “Speaking of trying as we might and not being able to get the relief we need.” He produced two steel wire-frames of a human penis. At the base of each was a padlock. Johnny gulped at the thought of enduring chastity. “Cage?”