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1.
He tries not to sigh when he notices what’s going on. He’s known Len for far, far, far too long not to recognize the signs the moment he sees them in his old friend. (He has to wish that Len’s ability to flirt when he means it had progressed somewhat since they’d met, but it has – apparently – not.)
And well…Haircut isn’t a bad guy. Not many pretty, spoiled guys like that would take a beating for someone like him.
So when Len slides past Haircut on the bridge and swipes his wallet he doesn’t say anything. Sara meets his eyes from across the table and gives a tiny smirk. (Smart girl’s figured it out already too.)
It isn’t until much later that Haircut’s surprised outrage can be heard as he discovers that his wallet is missing again. And given that the last five times it went missing it ended up in completely random locations it’s not as if they don’t know who to blame for it.
Well…mostly random.
Len seems to have developed a preference for stashing it with food items in some kind of attempt to get his favorite of their resident geniuses to eat.
He wonders if Len knows that just asking Haircut to have dinner with him might work better.
(Probably not, Mick realizes as he opens the fridge to find the missing wallet, but Mick isn’t going to be the one to clue his partner in on it when he’s got it this bad.)
2.
“C’mon, John Wayne,” Snart drawled, a dangerous glint in his eyes as he beckoned for Ray to follow him off the Waverider and into the field at the side of the ship.
The weather was nice(ish) and since they so rarely got a chance to be off the ship even after getting in trouble for their brawling and with trouble finding them most of the time ship’s crew were lazing about in the sunshine while they could.
Not Grey – he was up to something shifty, he could feel that but had decided not to ask – and Rip was still refusing to step off the ship. (Rip’s scary cowboy friend-slash-probably-ex was there, leaning in the doorway with that look that said no one who valued their lives should disturb his thinking so Jax was definitely avoiding that.) Kendra was out there but she went inside a little bit ago.
He had been listening to Ray ramble about the Old West because – well, the westerns that had him so excited were old (Ray was old too, just not Grey old, old) and he’s definitely too young to have watched that shit. Except now Snart’s swept up grabbed Ray by the arm to haul him over out of the way, nearer to where Sara and Kendra had been sparring earlier.
“You too, kid,” Snart fixes him with a look but doesn’t bother with the manhandling. “Time to make sure you two can actually shoot something.”
“Oo,” Sara hopped into step, “This sounds like fun. Can I help?”
“Why not? Make sure the kid doesn’t shoot himself.”
“Sure thing,” she smirked.
(Jax sorta misses when he was an only child.)
Luckily though it seems that the target of Sara’s mischief isn’t actually going to be him. She actually teaches him how to shoot with the old-timey guns just like promised. But she keeps grinning and looking over to where Ray and Snart are.
Which…fair.
Leonard’s using the lesson as an excuse to get reeeeeal hands-on with his demonstrations. His fingers lingering as he corrects Ray’s stance. Leaning close in to whisper his instructions into Ray’s ear – the slight smirk on his lips making it very clear that he could see just how red Ray had gone at that too.
“Does he think he’s being subtle?” he whispered to Sara.
Sara snorted before she whispered back, “Probably – I mean, it’s not like Ray’s noticed after all.”
“How’re they both so smart but so dumb too?”
“No idea, kid.”
Jax rolled his eye and took another shot at their makeshift target. He was getting better at hitting it now that he had a feel for what he was doing.
“I have an idea – for how to handle the Stillwater Gang,” Ray’s voice drifted over. “Snart – you’re a pretty good shot, right?” His voice dropped lower as he explained the plan he had to have Snart watch his back from a sharpshooter’s position when he confronted the gang with enthusiastic hand gestures while Snart watched him like he was the only thing in the world.
“That’s a terrible plan, Raymond,” Snart drawled, “I’m in.”
Of all the people on the ship she’d have thought to apply the term ‘Mother Hen’ to Snart was probably going to be the last on the list. But, well…
The first time Kendra noticed the behavior she’d been wandering the ship late enough at night to qualify better as ‘early morning’ and nearly ran into Snart as he was headed into the lab, a blanket draped over one arm.
“Didn’t know you were an owl,” there’d been no real bite to the comment though – and he seemed tired.
“What’re you doing?” she hadn’t been able to keep from following after him on bare feet. (It was better to have unpleasant company than to be alone with the press of four thousand years’ worth of memories.)
“Quiet,” the thief warned, his footsteps completely silent even in the heavy looking boots he wore. He padded over to Ray’s part of the lab.
Ray was asleep against the table, half sprawled across the A.T.O.M. and using it as what had to be a rather uncomfortable pillow.
Snart unfolded the blanket he’d brought, tucking it around Ray carefully. Once the inventor was safely wrapped up he paused and unclasped Ray’s fingers from the tiny screwdriver in them and set it aside. The thief then collected the empty plate that was sitting at the end of the work table.
“Should we leave him there?” Kendra asked quietly as she followed back out of the lab.
Snart glanced at her, a little disgruntled by the company before shrugging, “Not like the Boy Scout gets enough of it anyways.”
After that encounter she becomes increasingly aware of the little things that the thief pays mind to. The way Ray’s notebooks will disappear if he’s gone too long without resting, the way that when it’s Snart’s turn to cook it’s always wheat-free even though Ray’s said again and again that he doesn’t mind fabricating something else for himself.
Ray’s not caught onto why Snart does it, she thinks, but he lights up whenever he notices Snart’s little acts of kindness. It makes her glad that they didn’t decide to go further than those first awkward flirtations. They’re an odd match, maybe, but it fits.
4.
“It’s nice to see you again and all,” Felicity leaned over to examine what Ray was tinkering with. Not his suit for once but some application of his shrinking technology to medicine. “But don’t you think you should maybe stop pretending to be dead now?”
Ray glanced at her side-long before shaking his head, “I’m not back-back, it’s just for a few weeks so everyone can have a break from the ship. It’s dangerous out there – it’d be a little silly to announce I’m alive only for me to die again, don’t you think?”
“No. Dying,” she smacked his arm to punctuate each word as she glared at him. “Have you even told your family yet?”
Ray’s frown was answer enough. Of course he hadn’t. She was pretty sure the only people who knew that Ray Palmer was alive were superheroes and a handful of their nemesises. (Nemesi? Nemeses?)
“Ray,” she sighed.
“Felicity,” he looked at her. “Please.”
“…fine, but you can’t just stay here working in your lab the whole time. Promise me you won’t?” Ray opened his mouth. “And helping Oliver doesn’t count! You have to do something normal. We’re going to do it!”
Ray paused his tinkering to give her a grin that told her he’d spent way too much time in Sara’s company.
Her phone rang though saving her from having to try and talk her way around that.
“Felicity, are you okay?” Oliver’s tone was hurried, tight. The way he sounded when he was afraid for the people he loved.
“Yes,” she frowned. “I’m at the lab with Ray – what’s wrong?”
“Security there went dead. I’m on my way. Stay safe.”
“Alright,” she sat at the computer, beginning to pull up what she needed. Ray had moved to start putting the gauntlets from his suit on. The internal cameras had been killed – briefly in a moving pattern – but the external ones had caught a glimpse of the intruder. “It looks like it’s just one guy, he’s wearing some kind of fuzzy hood.”
“…like a parka?” Ray moved over to peer over her shoulder. “Huh.”
“Was that a good ‘huh’ or a bad ‘huh’?” she asked.
“Thought you said you were going to be here alone, Raymond,” the intruder leaned in the doorway. Eyes flicking over them both in an analytical manner. She might’ve been cowed by that gaze if she weren’t used to how intense Oliver was after so long with him – working with him.
Ray was smiling, “I thought you were staying in Central City?”
“I got bored,” the man pushed off the frame to slink across the room and closer to them. “Ms. Smoak, pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
“Len, be nice.”
“I’m always nice, Raymond,” Captain Cold (it has to be Leonard Snart because she can’t think of anyone else who it might be) raised a brow at him.
Ray snorted, disbelief and amusement pulling his lips into a smile she’d never seen on him before. Something more playful than his usual one.
“That was not your friendly voice.”
“No matter - I brought you a present, Boy Scout,” a diamond necklace glittered from his fingertips.
A very familiar diamond necklace.
“Is that..?” she blinked at it. Then at Snart. And oh. Oh! “I never pictured you as the jealous type.”
Snart flashes her an annoyed glare at that.
And passes the ten million dollar diamond necklace he definitely stole off to Ray like it’s just a trinket. (Ray at least catches it in a fumble instead of letting it fall and sets it on the table.) As if being casual about it will somehow make the gesture less extravagant.
“Would it be weird if I suggest that we go get dinner?” Felicity asked – grinning – “Oliver’s already on his way here.”
“Who am I to say ‘no’ to a terribly awkward double date?” Snart smirked.
5.
Sara finds herself leaning against Gideon’s console watching her crew bicker – well most of them are bickering. Mick’s just drinking and Ray and Len are standing quietly at the back not participating in the discussion. (Is it still a discussion when Zari and Grey are yelling?)
“You and me, Boy Scout. I got the popcorn and the drinks,” Len smirked as he wrapped an arm around Ray’s waist. “You get the movie?”
Ray hummed his agreement, relaxing since the team’s still debating over whose fault it was that the anachronism got worse so no one is paying attention to their PDA. “Star Wars?”
“Sounds perfect,” the kiss pressed to Ray’s shoulder is a quick butterfly of a thing but Len’s gotten a lot more openly clingy since the thing with the baby dominator. (Which, fair, she’s still not sure she’s totally over watching Ray blink out of existence right in front of them.)
Still. She owes Leonard for the last time he cheated at cards. And for all the whining she’s had to put up with for them to get to this stage.
“I’ll grab the pizza,” Sara smirks, announcing it loudly enough that everyone notices.
“Oh, movie night? I’m in,” Nate doesn’t notice but Amaya must’ve from the way she shakes he head slightly and shoots Len an apologetic look.
Ray gives one of his little half-sighs before his stupidly big smile is back on his face, “Alright. I’ll go get the movie set up and some extra seating. Meet everyone there in half an hour?”
“Best make it an hour,” Len drawled, giving her a dirty look before he pointedly grabbed Ray’s arm and pulled him off the bridge.
“…did we just crash their date plans?” Jax asks. “Cus Snart’s gonna kill us if we did.”
“Yup.” Zari popped the ‘p’ as obnoxiously as she could.
“Don’t forget to get Haircut’s pizza,” Mick told Sara.
They both knew that Snart wouldn’t be too cross as long as Ray ended up having a good night even if it was a different kind of ‘good’. Especially since he wasn’t nearly as frosty as he still pretended to be.
“Let’s pick some real pizza up then,” she decided. “Gideon – set a course for Central City.”
+1
“Hey, is that..?” Iris pulled him to a stop to stare at the pair in line debating their orders.
“No, you will not have a Flash, Raymond,” came an all too familiar put-upon drawl from the sunglasses wearing semi-former criminal. “You don’t need that much caffeine. No one needs that much caffeine, not even Scarlet.”
“Hey, I’m not complaining about you courting death-by-sucrose,” Ray pouted at him.
He’s not wearing a disguise but Ray also tends to forget that as a supposedly dead billionaire inventor there are actually people out there that would recognize him. Fewer in Central City than would recognize Snart, sure, but still.
“Yeah, that is definitely Snart and Ray,” Barry nodded. Felicity had mentioned that the two were dating but he hadn’t really believed it.
“Just order your regular, Boy Scout, before we get made.”
“Eagle,” Ray corrects but turns on that megawatt smile of his he gets when he’s making an effort to be charming and nice instead of being his usual cheerful dorky self to place their orders – apparently Len is getting a hot chocolate? Which is something Barry was not expecting and files away later to consider. But Ray’s bright personality effectively removes all the attention off his silent partner.
Snart catches sight of them staring and lowers his glasses enough to give them both an icy death glare that has vanished by the time Ray’s turned back around.
“So – I know we’re having dinner with Lisa, but I was thinking we should do something fun until then?”
“Raymond, are you asking me out on a date?”
Ray grins and ducks down to kiss Snart, it’s a quick thing, but sweet, “I am. Definitely. So?”
Barry has to smile just a little as Leonard Snart, the infamous Captain Cold has to shake off being overwhelmed by his boyfriend at close proximity. Even though Barry’s pretty sure they’ve been together a while. (But, well, Iris still has that effect on him too so maybe he shouldn’t judge.)
“Idiot,” Snart says but the way he says it is far too fond to be anything like an insult. “What did you have in mind?”
“Ice skating?”