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Barry woke up groggy and chilled, and it took him a moment to recognize his surroundings. The Cortex looked vaguely sinister in the dark, lit dimly by an unfamiliar blue glow. He shivered, and had just begun to cast around for a memory of why he was at STAR Labs at night (and why it was so cold) when his eyes landed on the source of the strange blue light.
It was the core of the cold gun, glowing steadily where it rested across the knees of a figure sleeping in the chair a few feet away. Len had one gloved hand still wrapped around the cold gun’s grip, but his head was tipped back against the wall and his eyes were closed. He looked younger like this, the sharp lines of his face thrown into relief from the faint blue light, and his lashes dark against his cheeks.
Barry spent a moment watching the slow, even movement of his chest as he breathed, and tried to remember why Captain Cold was sitting guard at his bedside.
Then he shivered, and his eyes tracked back to the gun. He remembered what Cisco had said about its heat signature, something about ultraviolet cold, and could guess at why the temperature in the room seemed to have dropped so precipitously while he’d slept.
That, and he’d managed to kick the blanket down around his legs at some point in the night. If night was the right word, anyway; he wasn’t certain what time it was. In this part of the lab, it was all but impossible to tell, and his recollection of what had led up to this was still a little fuzzy. The hospital bed wasn’t overly alarming, despite the host of bad memories that went along with its innocuous white sheets and cool metal frame, but he did a quick scan of his body for injuries anyway. Heavy bandages wrapped around his chest and up to one shoulder, and Barry recognized Caitlin’s neat handiwork. He was more relieved than anything else; whatever had happened, Caitlin was safe, and well enough to have bound his broken ribs.
For one alarming moment, Barry thought he couldn’t feel his toes. Another shiver reminded him of the chill in the room, though, and he realized that was probably to blame.
He sighed and tried to push up onto one arm to recover the blanket, but a sickening grinding in his shoulder, bone against bone, made him drop back against the sheets with a sharp gasp. He screwed his eyes shut against the pain and heard Len stir in the chair next to him. With some effort, he managed to crack an eye open in time to see Len lift himself half out of the chair, gaze sharp with alarm. He hovered for a moment, likely judging if he actually needed help or was just talking in his sleep.
Noting the uncharacteristic concern in his expression, Barry reached for the words to explain about the blanket and the gun. Another shiver wracked him, and he groaned against the jolt to his shoulder, and reached up to wrap numb fingers around the bandages there.
“Cold,” he managed.
Len lifted himself the rest of the way out of his chair. He set the gun down on the rolling tray next to the bed, and began stripping off his gloves.
“I’m here,” Len said, and Barry breathed a laugh despite the ache in his ribs.
“No," he rasped, "I’m cold."
Len paused, as if he hadn’t considered that Barry’s complaint would be anything so mundane. Easy for him to say; he was still wearing a parka. Len’s gaze swept over his bandaged chest, where his skin had taken on an unhealthy pallor in the faint light of the cold gun. Barry saw him note the blanket tangled around his ankles, then sweep the rest of the room, as if he’d only just remembered where they were. It was an interesting thought; Barry couldn’t help but wonder what had been running through Len’s mind if, half awake, he’d so readily accepted finding him in the same room, shirtless and sleepy-eyed and murmuring his name.
He felt a blush creep across his cheeks, because the conclusions were fairly limited there. Len had dropped his gaze though, and Barry could see him shoring up his Cold persona again. He dropped his shoulders back and shifted his weight lazily to one hip as he considered him. Then, after a moment of conflicted silence, he reached out and pulled the blanket up Barry’s chest anyway.
It held the residual cold of the room, and Barry caught Len’s wrist as he started to pull away. To his surprise, Len winced in pain, and Barry remembered all at once what had happened.
There had been a group of bank robbers; humans, not metas, but in from out of town. The Rogues had taken issue with that, and Barry had found himself with unexpected backup when he’d shown up to rescue hostages. The details were blurry: Heatwave punching out one of the robbers after he lost his gun; Golden Glider scuffling with the getaway driver; Hartley sprinting towards the basement to do something involving the alarms.
He could remember with perfect clarity, however, the moment they’d thought the last of the robbers was down. Len had pushed back his hood to grin at him from across the room, and had just opened his mouth to deliver what was sure to be a terrible pun when the grenade had gone off at his feet.
There hadn’t been time to think; one of the robbers must have dropped it in the scuffle, and if Barry had been any further away, the casualties would’ve been staggering. Even so, he barely managed to get there in time to shove Len back with all the force he could muster and take the worst of the explosion himself.
He wished the memories had stopped there, but it was all too easy to recall the shrapnel ripping through the suit, and the crushing pain of half a dozen ribs giving way from the force of the blast.
“Hey,” Len said sharply, dragging him back to the present. Barry hadn't realized he was squeezing Len’s wrist in a bruising grip, and he forced his fingers to loosen. Len crouched next to the bed so they were eye-level. “You’re safe now. It’s over.”
Barry took an unsteady breath, and tried not to wince against the pull in his side.
“Everyone else?” he managed.
“Alive.” Len paused, then looked away, jaw tight. “Weren’t sure we were gonna be able to say the same about you, for a while there.”
Barry relaxed back against the pillow with a relieved sigh. As long as the others were okay, he could take whatever lecture was coming for him in the morning.
There hadn’t been any thought coherent in his head when he’d reached for Len, just a sharp anxiety at the thought of having him out of sight, but he found himself disinclined to let go now. Len’s skin was warm under the sleeve of his parka, and Barry fanned his numb fingers over it and looked up at Len plaintively.
Len looked surprised for a moment, then shook his head.
“Get some sleep,” he said, and moved to step away. Unprompted, Barry's mind offered up another montage of the grenade rolling to a stop in front of Len's boots, and he doubled down on his grip with a fresh stab of panic. He gritted his teeth against the answering complaint in his shoulder, and couldn’t quite swallow a pained noise. Len stopped short, and Barry, despite feeling slightly foolish, pressed the advantage. He inched his hand a little higher, chasing the warmth up his sleeve, and gave a weak tug.
“I'm trying to,” he said.
“I'll find another blanket,” Len said. Barry held fast to his arm, and Len sighed, clearly unwilling to pull against his grip again. “Let go, Barry.”
“I saved your life.” His voice was barely above a whisper, but the annoyed look on Len’s face told Barry he’d heard him. He tried to grin, and managed a quirk of his lips. “The least you can do is share some body heat.”
Len looked longingly back towards his chair, but it was with an air of resignation. When Barry gave another careful tug, he let him pull him a step closer.
“Just until I fall asleep,” Barry angled. “Please?”
His lips finally cooperated in a pleased smile when Len dropped his shoulders in exaggerated defeat.
He moved closer to the bed, and Barry withdrew his hand to burrow under the blankets. He made a sharp noise of displeasure, though, when Len reached for the covers.
“Coat,” he objected. Len raised an eyebrow, and Barry glared at him over the edge of the blanket. “I can’t steal your heat if you’re all bundled up like that.”
Len eyed him for a long moment. When he realized he wasn’t joking, he sighed, but began stripping out of the parka anyway.
The narrowness of his shoulders was a surprise, and Barry realized he could count on one hand the number of times he’d seen him out of it. Len was tall, but closer to his own build than he’d thought. He managed to take up a lot of space despite it—the oversized coat, his habit of sprawling out in chairs whenever he sat down—and Barry wondered for the first time if that was by design. He looked younger without the ridiculous coat, somehow more human.
Len was studiously avoiding his gaze in a way that told Barry he knew he had an audience, but the blanket was beginning to warm to Barry's skin, and he was too tired to care. Len bent to kick off his boots, and Barry shuffled back to make room for him.
It was a tight fit, and Len’s expression told Barry that he considered the entire situation to be below his dignity, but Barry couldn't be bothered to worry about it as rolled onto his side and pressed against his warmth. He tangled their legs together and curled the fingers of one hand around the cuff of Len’s sleeve. He slipped the other under the hem of Len's shirt, blindly seeking out the warm skin of his stomach, and Len jerked in surprise. He caught Barry around the wrist like he was going to pull his hand away, but Barry burrowed closer and murmured an apology against Len’s shoulder.
He knew from experience the sharp, metallic scent the cold gun left in the air after it fired, but the smell didn't cling to Len’s skin. There was only the faint scent of shaving cream, light and familiar, and Barry tucked his face closer, murmuring a pleased note of approval against the warm skin there.
“Your hands are freezing,” Len said tersely. His voice rumbled in his chest as he spoke, and Barry answered him with a sleepy hum.
“S’what I said,” he muttered, and he felt as much as heard Len sigh in response.
When he woke a few hours later, the Cortex outside the room was still dark, and it took Barry a few moments to place the warm body that he was curled around. The earlier memories came rushing back, and Barry took an anxious consolation in the steady heartbeat under his palm, where he seemed to have pushed his hand further under Len’s shirt during the night to rest over his heart. He was nestled against Len’s side, head resting against his bicep in a way that had probably caused his arm to fall asleep by now, but he could tell by Len’s breathing that he was still dozing.
The cold gun had long since powered down, and the lab’s climate controls had managed to get the room up to a livable temperature again. Even so, Barry couldn’t bring himself to extricate himself from Len’s arms, and he pushed aside his faint embarrassment in favor of dropping his head against Len’s shoulder again. Len pulled him closer with a quiet murmur of his name, and Barry felt a warm glow in his chest that had nothing to do with the thermostat. He decided to stay, just for another hour or so. They’d probably still be up before the rest of Team Flash got in for the morning, and no one had to be any wiser.
- - -
“Make sure you get the cold gun in the picture,” Iris whispered, and Cisco waved her away impatiently.
“You think I’d crop my tech out of frame?” he hissed back. “Now stop backseat photographing and hold onto my shirt.”
Iris sighed but held his collar as he leaned around the doorframe to get a better shot.
“He’s going to murder us,” she said with a barely-suppressed giggle, and Cisco checked the picture with a critical eye.
“No, he’s not. He’ll be so excited we’re all alive, he’ll just give us that disappointed puppy face until I delete it.”
“Don’t think she was talking about Barry,” said a dangerously quiet voice from inside the room.
Cisco dropped his phone, and Iris dropped him.
He managed to catch himself on the door frame, but his phone hit the ground with a loud clatter, and Len raised an eyebrow at them.
Barry’s brow furrowed where his face was tucked against Len’s chest, and he muttered something grumpy-sounding that Cisco didn’t quite catch. Len maintained pointed eye contact as he stroked a lazy hand down Barry’s back, bare except for the bandages, and the casual possessiveness of the gesture made Cisco gape in affront.
“Go back to sleep,” Len murmured against Barry’s hair. He raised his voice enough to carry to the doorway, and Iris poked her head over Cisco’s shoulder, curiosity clearly getting the better of her.
Barry sighed and slid his hand down Len’s chest—and wow, okay, his hand was under Cold’s shirt, Cisco did not need to see that—then wrapped his arm around Len’s waist and buried his face against his shoulder. Len smirked.
“Oh my god,” Cisco croaked, and Iris leaned around him to take another picture.