He'd faced more than his fair share of Christmas parties over the years. Sometimes he'd been there on a job, or to sell his cover. Sometimes he'd been there in the shadows waiting for his target to stray away from the herd. Always under Romulus's orders however. The ancient mutant had ruled Daken's life since before he'd even been born.

This would be the first Christmas he'd ever spent completely free of his former master's orders and constraints. Sufficing to say he'd just wanted a quiet one away from all of the madness. Which explained why he was in Christmas grand central station in New York.. "I tell you what, you fly across the country and claw your way through millions of Christmas shoppers jay walking, clogging up the streets and generally being a nuisance and then you can talk to me about being grumpy."

Daken wandered over to Bucky and leaned in to kiss him because he wanted to. Not because they were acting out some ridiculous romance or anything. But just because it had been weeks and he'd been celibate the whole time. Something that got under his skin and scratched at him incessantly.

He was not in a relationship, dammit. That phony piece of paper from Las Vegas meant nothing. Daken tried to convince himself he just kept coming back because he was using Bucky just like he'd used every other person in his life. It even worked sometimes!