Chapter Text
“And that’s why you don’t just barge into battle, Aqua.” Yellow lectures, holding up a finger as he lectures the two children in front of him, “You always give a trial to criminells ‘cause they could be innocent… and then go into battle.”
The two children stare up at him, one, dressed in purple, glancing between the tall cowboy and writing in their notebook, and the other swaying around, her cyan dress fluttering around her. She shoots her hand up, her long sleeve flailing in the air as she waves it frantically,
“Ooh! Ooh! So if someone does anything bad, it’s like… interrogating?” she asks, excitedly.
“Exactly!” Yellow affirms, nodding with a pleased smile on his face.
“No no!” the one dressed in purple says, shaking their head, “Interrogation is when you use pressure to make them admit something! Trial is when you use evidence and suspects to figure out who did the crime.”
Aqua thinks for a moment, bringing her hand up to her chin,
“Uuu… but that sounds like a lot of work! I would rather play a game with them!”
“Your knife-throwing isn’t a game, Aqua,” Seth says, pushing their glasses up.
“It does too! Human Kris played with me that one time,” she exclaims.
Yellow stares down at the young flowers bickering, waving his hands around in an attempt to pacify them,
“Now don’t get all riled up now, ya hear?” he says, raising his voice. “It’s already late; Green’s prolly already asleep.”
The children ignore him, Seth shoving their notebook at Aqua as they point at it aggressively while Aqua giggles. The three are too distracted to notice the sound of someone coming down the staircase to their right,
“Yellow, dearest? Are you down here? It’s already quite late and… oh!” The footsteps stop short of the group, an older ballerina now standing across from them, “Aqua, Seth, what are you two still doing up, lovelies?”
Yellow’s eyes light up as they land on Blue, a smile spreading across his face. The younger individuals look up at the new figure in the room, immediately ceasing their argument,
“Yellow started it!” they said in unison, pointing up at the cowboy.
The amber colored man gasps, shock falling across his face,
“No-! Blue, you oughta believe me, these here children were askin’ me a bunch of questions about criminells and then started fightin’!”
“Noooo, you were telling us about interrogation,” Aqua says, clapping her hands.
Seth nods along, clutching their notebook to them,
“And trials for uh… criminals,” they say, looking up at Blue with a persistent look on their face, “He knows a lot about it, Blue! Isn’t that suspicious? Maybe… he’s a criminal!”
Blue looks between the kids before looking up at Yellow, whose jaw has dropped in shock. He smiles softly at the three as he watches Yellow’s head drop,
“Now, now, lovelies, you know Yellow isn’t a criminal.” He says, kneeling to meet them at eye level, “He was just trying to teach you guys some things. Besides, it’s getting quite late, isn’t it?”
The two look at Blue before each other,
“Well… I guess if it was for the sake of education…” Seth trails off.
Aqua sways beside them, looking up at Blue as if thinking super hard,
“Uuu, it is super late! I just got super tired; how’d you know that, Blue?” Aqua asks, excitedly, looking up at him.
Blue smiles down at her, patting her head thoughtfully before standing up,
“Well, it’s been a few hours since we all slept,” he says, smoothing out his tutu. “I think Orange finished building your guys’ bunk bed. You asked her and Green, right?"
The two seemed to light up immediately, giggling over the prospect of their room being completed. They swung each other in a circle before linking arms and running off towards the direction of the room they had claimed.
Blue chuckles lightly, watching the two scamper off before he looks back at Yellow, who was now half slumped over. He smiles lovingly as he walks up to the cowboy,
“Yellow…” he calls softly, “It’s time for bed, dearest.”
Yellow lets out a noise that sounds like a mix of a sigh and a groan,
“Go without me, Blue… I don’t deserve to sleep in a bed tonight…”
“Why ever not, dearest?” he asks.
Yellow pulls himself up, slipping his hat off his head as he holds it right below his chin,
“You heard ‘em, Blue, I’m a criminell,” he says, his gaze dropping to the floor, “I don’t want you tah’ sleep beside a criminell…”
Blue looks at him before reaching out and patting his head,
“You’re no criminal, Yellow, don’t say that,” he says softly. “They were just being silly; it sounds like you were just teaching them something.”
“But they must be right! I must be a criminell if I know so much about ’em…”
“You know so much about them…” he starts, reaching out for Yellow’s hat, “because you’re willing to give each one a fair chance and know how to point out good versus bad behavior.”
He reaches up, placing the cowboy hat back on Yellow’s head, before cupping a side of his face. Yellow looks at him, his eyes nearly shimmering with adoration,
“You… you really think so?” he asks, his eyes still full of uncertainty.
Blue smiles before leaning up and pressing a soft kiss to Yellow’s forehead, much to the other man’s astonishment,
“Of course I do; it’s one of the things I love about you,” he says before reaching down and slipping his hand into the cowboy’s, “Now can we go to bed? I’ve waited all day to see you.”
Yellow smiles awkwardly at Blue before curling his fingers around Blue’s hand and walking towards the bedroom they’d picked out.
__________
The door clicks shut behind them as they walk into their room. It had been made up shortly after the group of heroes left. A bed pressed up against the back wall in the middle of the room, the sheets carefully folded each morning by Yellow.
On one side of the bed sits a nightstand with a vase of blue flowers atop it, while on the other side stands a hat tree, each of the branches holding identical cowboy hats. Next to the door stands a (mostly empty) dresser with a lamp and a few photos atop it.
Yellow takes his gun out of its holster, not that it was loaded at all, only there because Yellow claimed it made him more ‘cowboy-y’. He carefully places it on the dresser before the two separate momentarily, Blue folding his tutu before putting it in one of drawers of the dresser. Yellow hangs up his hat before shucking off his tasseled jacket, hanging it up on the one free branch of the tree beside his side of the bed,
“It’s so nice that we were able to make rooms for ourselves properly, isn’t it?” Blue says, smiling gently as he comes up to the opposite side of the bed, pulling the covers back, “I ran into Orange earlier, and she was telling me about everything she helped make for the others’ rooms. Apparently she made a hammock for Green’s room.”
Yellow smiles as he sits down on the edge of the bed, leaning down to pull his boots off,
“It sure is. I’m real happy she did ours first, after Flowery’s of course.”
Blue slides into bed, pulling the covers up as he settles back into his pillow, turning to face Yellow,
“Yeah… I checked up on him today; he seems to be doing a lot better, still pretty tired though.” Yellow looks down at Blue lovingly before slipping in next to him, pulling the covers up over them. Blue reaches for him, pulling Yellow closer to him. “I missed you today, dearest.”
Yellow wraps his arms around Blue’s waist as he rests his head on his chest out of habit,
“Me too, Blue. How was yer day?”
Blue presses a kiss into Yellow’s hair before reaching up to run his fingers through it,
“Just helped around the gardens. I finished fixing up my stage, so after that I just floated around where I was needed. How about you, my dear?”
“I finished tidyin’ up the shooting rooms; tomorrow I’ll hang the targets back up,” he says as he turns his head to look up at Blue, his eyes full of adoration, “Y’know… yer awfully pretty, Blue.”
Blue chuckles at that, leaning forward to press another kiss to his cheek,
“Truly, Yellow?”
The cowboy nods quickly, his gaze full of sincerity,
“Of course! I would never lie to you, Blue,” he says. “Ya know, I could’ve fixed up yer stage… you didn’t have to get all dirty…”
Blue smiles as he brings his hand down from his hair, tracing the features of Yellow’s face,
“Oh, that’s all right, dearest. You were busy with other things.”
Yellow nods as he takes Blue’s hand in his, running his fingers over the other man’s knuckles,
“I know… I also don’t want you gettin’ hurt, darlin’” he says, pressing a kiss to the ballerina’s palm to hide his cheeks flaring up.
Blue runs a thumb over Yellow’s cheek before leaning forward, pressing his lips to the cowboy’s,
“You don’t need to worry about such trivial matters, my dear,” he says against his lips before pulling back.
Yellow’s eyes seem to sparkle as he looks back at Blue, seemingly mesmerized,
“I must be mighty lucky to have you as my boyfriend, Blue.” he says before clearing his throat and holding up a finger almost like Seth, “I hear that’s what them humans call romantical partners.”
Blue stares at Yellow before laughing softly,
“We’re both lucky to have each other,” he says.
“Maybe it’s fate!” Yellow pipes up, “Er… I overheard Flowery when them heroes were still here. Talkin’ ‘bout some kind of prophecy. Figured… that must mean we were meant to find each other and all.”
It’s Blue’s turn to look at Yellow adoringly, his sapphire eyes looking over the latter’s face. Without thinking, he leans forward again, pressing his lips to Yellow’s. The cowboy laughs before pressing back with eagerness.
Their lips move against each other’s in a rhythm practiced over the last few weeks from being in their new human-like bodies. Yellow wraps his arms around Blue’s waist as he leans up to kiss him in bed. Blue carefully cups Yellow’s face before moving across his jaw and down his neck, pressing feather-light kisses to the amber skin.
Yellow breathes a sigh of contentment out through his nose, his breath tickling Blue’s ear. He laughs softly before pulling away, looking down at Yellow again,
“Gosh, yer pretty…” Yellow says under his breath before his eyes widen immediately, as if he hadn’t meant to say it out loud.
He buries his face back into Blue’s chest, much to the other man’s amusement. He returns his hands to Yellow’s hair, running his fingers through it as he presses one last kiss to the top of his head,
“Good night, dearest,” he murmurs into the gold strands of hair.
“‘Night, darlin’” comes muffled from where Yellow lay beside him.