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Cold Atlesian winds whipped through the sky, scattering innocent puffs of bleached snow across the endless expanse of white. They lashed at Qrow's back, biting into his shoulders and making him shiver. The snow burned on his knees and hands as he gripped at it like a rope, a lifeline, begging his hands to hold but always slipping past any sense of security. All he could feel was cold. An inescapable straightjacket of the dead of winter wrapped around every inch of his body, leaving him shuddering and shaking desperately to fight it off and keep himself intact. Its teeth reached his nose, his cheeks, his eyes, lighting them in a freezing fire as he finally snapped his view back from the sheet-white snowfield.
He saw crimson first, then blue, then tan. He reached a trembling hand down and pressed it against a still-warm body, feeling its dying heat on his dampened palm. He finally forced himself to look up, to meet the cadaver's face. Cheeks once flushed with life paling by the second, fluffy hair mottled with frost and snow, and shuddering lips drawing slower and slower breaths. Qrow felt the red slick beneath it smear as he dragged his hand over the man's chest. He finally met Clover's eyes.
Teal was the color of oceans, of seas of possibilities, of getaways on sandy shores and the warmth of a new sun. Now the water was stormy, slowly fading from brightness to a murky, sad gray. Qrow never realized when he leaned in close enough to feel the man's breath on his face. Short clouds of nothingness caressed his cheeks, flying over his eyelids and threatening to make him blink them closed. He felt water pricking his eyes. He couldnt look away. He couldn't move, or think. He was locked down, drowning himself in a dying ocean, watching the life slowly fade away as the seconds passed in his prescence. His mind desperately begged for sunrise yet he felt nothing on his face, knowing he sat under a dark and unforgiving sky. Warmth leeched out of Clover's body until he felt ice under his palm. The storm was growing darker. He couldn't breathe.
"Qrow!"
Qrow shot up, panting and shaking with violent force. He blinked rapidly, eyes darting left to right to take in his surroundings. The snow had faded, yet he still felt the cold on his face. His vision was greeted with darkness, near all-encompassing, but just thin enough to make out a familiar sight. He was in bed, staring out at the simple decorations of a comfortable bedroom. He looked over to find the source of his name, and caught himself drowning for a moment.
Seas greeted him as he blinked more to clear the haze. Clover was sitting up, right next to him, looking worried. His eyebrows were scrunched with concern, and a hand was halfway reached out to the terrified Qrow before him. As soon as Qrow realized what had happened, he let out the longest breath he'd ever taken and buried his head in his shaking hands. Just a nightmare. An all-too real one, but just a nightmare nonetheless.
"Qrow, are…" Clover spoke, hesitantly pulling his arm back. "…are you okay?"
It took Qrow a moment to find his words. "Yeah, I'm good," he croaked out, voice hoarse from the emotions that burned at the back of his throat. "Nightmare."
Clover's face shifted from concern to understanding. This had been a common occurance ever since the two had reunited - visions of darkness and Clover's almost-demise plaguing the huntsman as he slept. Whenever Qrow had described his dreams, they had always been in terrifying detail, making Clover shudder just at the thought of almost reliving that hellish day. He could tell - this one was lifelike, deep, and troubling. Clover reached his hand out again to press it against Qrow's back in reassurance, bracing himself as he found it cold.
"Qrow, you can talk to me, you know. About anything." He spoke in a hushed tone, trying to sense any change in demeanor through the huntsman's strained hands. When no response came, he sighed lightly. "Can I help you in any way?"
Qrow lifted his head out of his hands, his dark bangs falling back over his face as he breathed in the urge to cry. He didn't cry often, but he found it to be harder to suppress ever since that day. Everything about his routine was off; nothing was constant anymore, it was all changing. He hated it. He didn't want to feel like this every single damn night - helpless, weak, guilty. He forced himself to turn back to Clover, swallowing as he looked over his partner's face.
After a few shaking breaths he leaned in closer and rested his forehead on Clover's chest. It was warm, warmer than anything he'd felt that night. Strong arms closed around his back and he returned with wrapping his own around Clover's torso, the urge to sob subsiding with each second he spent like this. He felt safe now. He could breathe.
"Y-yeah," he huffed out, tightening his grip on Clover. "Can I…hold you?"
He was sure such a strange request would be laughed off, and was even more sure he was proved right by the small chuckle that followed. However, as he picked his head up to look back at Clover, he saw nothing but softness in his teal eyes. Only Clover could be so accepting of a question like that.
"Of course," Clover murmured, bending his head down to lay a soft kiss on Qrow's forehead. "Anything for you." His smile could light up the entire room on it's own. Qrow could almost feel the sun's warmth on his face just from being near it.
After letting out a breath he never knew he'd been holding, Qrow freed himself from their embrace and began to move around until he was sitting behind Clover. He pressed his body against Clover's back, finding it comfortably warm. Clover's eyes were trained on him the entire time as Qrow curled his arms once more around his partner's strong torso, resting his chin on his shoulder. Clover moved slightly to indicate that he wanted to lay down, and Qrow obliged, letting himself fall with him as they settled into a cuddling position. Qrow shuffled around underneath the blankets until he found a comfortable spot for his legs, and after doing so, took a moment to drink in the situation. Clover's strong, warm body was tucked safely in his arms, as real as day. Qrow's hands balled into fists. He was never going to be letting go anytime soon.
He slid his head until his face rested in the crook of Clover's neck and took a soft breath. Clover gave a small laugh from where it tickled his skin, and gave a little shimmy to show he was comfortable. Qrow sighed and pressed his forehead against Clover's skin, reveling in its warmth. He felt so alive, so different from the corpse he had seen in his dream. It was impossible for the two to be the same. He could ground himself in this comfort, in this moment where he felt safe - this was reality. The nightmare had passed. Clover was here.
Qrow found one of his hands drifting down to rest over Clover's heart. He could sense its steady rhyhm beneath Clover's slow, relaxed breathing, beating a constant reminder of I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine. Just imagining it was replacing any memory of the hollow, icy husk he thought would await him. That was warm, too. Every single part of Clover's body glowed like a radiator at the perfect temperature - never hot enough to burn. Qrow peered over Clover's shoulder at his body, reminded of how it was always meant to look.
Qrow's hand froze, hovering over the gigantic gash on the middle of Clover's chest. His eyes grew wide as a small gasp escaped him. He couldn't believe he had forgotten about the scar. Shock and guilt gripped him from all sides, threatening to push back the images from his dream. He swore he saw red underneath his trembling hand.
Clover, who had been paying close attention to his partner to make sure he was comfortable, noticed his shaking resurface. He reached a hand up and ran it through Qrow's hair a few times reassuringly, trying to catch his eyes. Qrow only continued to stare down at his chest, vision locked on the garish scar that cut Clover's chest in half. Clover swallowed hard, knowing exactly what Qrow was feeling.
Working up his courage, Qrow held his breath and reached down to touch the marred skin. As soon as his fingertips made contact, he flinched away. He couldn't even look at it anymore. He squeezed his eyes tight, pressing his face even harder into Clover's back, other arm tensing around his partner's form. Memories were resurfacing rapidly, battering his mind and pulling back emotions he didn't want to revisit. His breathing grew heavy and frantic.
The rhythmic fingers through his hair managed to pull him back from the brink of a panic attack as Clover focused his efforts on calming Qrow down. "Qrow, please, look at me," he whispered, an audible break in his voice betraying his outward confidence. After a bout of silence Qrow lifted his eyes to meet Clover's, red with blinked-back tears and swimming with fear and guilt.
Clover breathed in deeply, centering his own emotions to be able to face Qrow. "It's okay," he breathed, taking his hand back from its entanglement in the huntsman's dark locks to instead stabilize his shaking hand. "That's in the past, Qrow. You don't need to feel like this."
Qrow responded with a low grumble and halfhearted nod. Sighing at the compromise, Clover released Qrow's hand and curled his body back over, letting his partner do his own thing while being acutely aware of his condition. He knew Qrow - he needed to gain more confidence on his own, but that didn't mean Clover wouldn't be there to catch him if he fell. He tried his best to relax himself and waited for Qrow's response.
The huntsman, having calmed down enough from his panicked state, took a large breath in through his nose and tried to lower his fingers again. Slowly he rested his hand on the tough, smooth skin, almost instantly reacting to the urge to pull it away. Clover let out a small, light-hearted chuckle in an attempt to clear the mood. "You're allowed to touch me, you know."
Qrow caught himself smiling briefly at the remark, relaxing his hand on Clover's chest before returning to his previous state of mind. He still couldn't rid his mind of the visions - dark images of crimson on snow, the fading warmth of life, cold steel slick with blood tearing through perfect skin. His own steel. It may as well have been his own hand driving it through. He swallowed deeply, allowing himself to slowly drag his fingertips down the scar, a pale blemish on a beautiful figure. "I-I know, it's just…" he croaked out, voice hoarse from the emotions threatening to leak through his lips. "I can't believe I did something like this to you."
"You didn't do this." Clover immediately corrected him, his voice a touch harsher and louder, making his adamance on the subject obvious. "Tyrian did. Not you," he stated firmly.
The huntsman didn't speak back, unsure of how to respond, only drawing small, absent-minded circles into Clover's chest with his fingertip. After a long silence, he opened his mouth for a response. "But it was still my fault -"
"It's no more your fault that mine. If anything, it was completely on me for even siding with Ironwood in the moment," Clover snapped back, his voice almost sounding hurt as he broke his position to turn on his side, facing a scared Qrow. "What I'm trying to say is that it's no one person's 'fault,' Qrow. No semblance did this." He spoke clearly and calmly now, allowing his voice to drop as he realized how concerned Qrow was getting. "But most of all, it's over. We're not fighting anymore, and we're both okay. The storm has passed."
Qrow looked deep into Clover's soft eyes, finding that indeed his words were true in a way he couldn't have intended. The oceans he found in them were calm, peaceful - ones filled with life and love instead of the anger and darkness he had seen in his hellish nightmare. He found himself taking slower breaths, his heartbeat leaving his ears. After a deep inhale, the clouds in his head dissipated, cut through by a ray of sunlight. Clover was here, he was safe - they both were. And he was right, too. The past was the past, and the present might as well have been heaven compared to what they had faced together.
Clover sensed Qrow's calm and gave a warm smile. "You do realize that, either way, you were touching the scar on my back the whole time," he smirked, trying to lighten the conversation. Qrow had a split second of realization in his eyes, a hint of his earlier panic, but it subsided near instantly as he gave a quick laugh of his own.
The sound of it nearly melted Clover. Qrow's laugh, his real laugh - not sarcastic or riddled with sadness as it had been in the past - was pure gold. He sounded so truly happy, even just from a simple joke, and it shone through on his face. It was the warmest sound Clover had ever heard, and he felt his heart flutter as he watched Qrow's cheeks tint from this moment. As brief as it was, times like this were what Clover lived for - the times Qrow was truly, unabashedly content.
Turns out his smile was infectious. Qrow was staring back into Clover's face, which was smiling ear to ear and practically exploding with love. Qrow's cheeks almost began to hurt from how wide he was smiling. Nobody else had made him feel this way - even in such a dark time in his life, he had found such incredible happiness. Clover cared for him, made him feel loved, made him feel safe and worthy. He was the best luck Qrow had ever had in his life.
Neither of them could really tell when their faces had gotten so close, but that didn't matter. All that mattered were Clover's soft lips resting against Qrow's in a wordless conversation. Qrow wrapped an arm around Clover's neck and pulled him in closer, kissing him slowly. Clover was so warm, his lips so smooth and perfect, so gentle and loving and just so gods damned incredible. He never wanted to lose him again - and never planned on it either. This was here, this was now, a moment so tender and caring it melted away the bleak snowfield of his dreams and breathed fresh life into frozen lips. Qrow couldn't ask for anything more.
Clover wasn't exempt from these feelings - he found himself sinking into Qrow's touch, responding to each press of his lips. The huntsman's stubble scratched against his own skin so gently, it made his face heat up from the waves of adoration. It was a dream in it's own to even have been working with Qrow before, but now, kissing him with such pure love and comfort, Clover was positive he'd found heaven.
After being lost in each other's prescence for a few more moments, Qrow broke away and stared at Clover, eyes positively sparkling with happiness. He looked away after a second of pause, seemingly somehow embarrassed to be so close. "I, uh, I had better get some sleep now," he mumbled to himself like a teenager with a crush.
How could one man be this adorable? Clover grinned impossibly wider and played with Qrow's soft hair, soothing him. "Sweet dreams, then."
With a final smile, Qrow rolled back on his side, facing away from Clover. He sat there for a few moments, wondering whether or not he should say anything more before he felt warmth against his back again. Clover was holding him now, his strong frame protecting Qrow, reassuring him that everything was alright. Qrow smiled, closing his eyes slowly. Everything was perfect right now. It didnt even matter if his nightmares came back to him - every single time he knew Clover was right by his side to fight them off. He was safe here, and warm, warmer than he had ever felt. He could already feel sleep closing in on his eyelids, drawing the curtain on a comforting scene.
"Good night, Qrow," Clover whispered faintly. "I love you."
Qrow didn't need to say it back as he drifted off into the darkness. They both knew he did, too.