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Sodo looked down at his hands.
“Oh, oops,” he murmured quietly to himself as he saw a glistening red bead of crimson beginning to run down his finger. He looked at the others, wondering if any of them had noticed. They hadn’t, all were continuing on with the show as normal, so he just gave a slight shrug and wiped his finger on his guitar, giving it the first of what would be many red streaks on the white paint that night.
Square Hammer, the last song of the show, and by this point Sodo had basically completely forgotten all about his bloody finger. The pain he had initially felt from it had subsided and he had become lost in the music that he was playing.
Rain came over to stand next to Sodo for the opening riff of the song, as he usually did, but as he began to play he smelt something odd. Strong, metallic, hitting his nostrils like a truck. He followed the smell with his head and it angled towards Sodo’s guitar. Upon seeing the multiple red splashes that had been slashed across the instrument, Rain’s eyes widened in shock under his mask. He moved his wide eyes up to Sodo’s face, and saw that the fire ghoul was aggressively playing his riff like he always did, seemingly oblivious to the blood. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Aether, who was on the other side of Sodo, do a double take at the state of the white guitar.
‘Things sure are going to be interesting after the show tonight,’ Rain thought to himself as he continued playing and returned his focus to the audience.
--
“You silly ghoul, you didn’t have to keep playing!” Copia said in a worried but affectionate tone. The show had ended, and the band were winding down for the evening. Copia was gently holding onto Sodo’s hand, looking closely at the finger that had drenched it in blood.
“It’s not that bad, besides, it looked like the people loved it!” Sodo replied casually, a smirk on his now unmasked face. Copia gave him a disapproving scowl as he let go of the ghoul’s hand, like an unapproving mother of her teenage son.
“But you need to look after yourselves! I like to know that my ghouls are okay,” Copia said, shaking his head and wagging a finger. He noticed that there was a speck of blood on his gloved hand and hastily wiped it onto his trousers. Once he made sure that he had removed the blood from his glove, he began to look around saying “now where is the medical bag?” as he did so.
“It’s okay Papa, I’ve got it,” Rain said, holding up the small green med kit for Copia to see.
“Ah, excellent! Now that’s sorted…” Copia trailed off as he walked away, murmuring to himself about other issues he needed to attend to. The ghouls watched him go, and once he was out of eyesight, Sodo turned to look at Rain.
“Rain, honestly, I don’t need it, I’m fine,” Sodo said. He was trying his best to ignore the pain that had started to come back when attention had been drawn to the injury. Rain just looked back at him with a fed up stare.
“Sodo, sit,” he said simply, pointing to a chair with one outstretched hand.
“Hey! You can’t just command me like I’m a dog!” Sodo protested, throwing his hands out in frustration. Rain seemed unphased.
“Sodo, sit in that chair and let me help you or I’m going to call Aether and Swiss over here to put you in that chair themselves,” Rain said. Even though he was being stern, there was still a softness to his voice, like it was almost impossible for Rain to ever be fully angry at someone.
“Fine,” Sodo huffed as he grumpily strode over to the chair Rain had been pointing at. He sat down with some aggression, folding one leg over the other as his tail twitched with obvious annoyance. His bothered tone faltered a little as he exhaled out a short laugh before muttering, “that sounds kinda hot to be honest.” Rain decided to ignore the comment and Sodo’s expression returned to one of discontent.
“Thank you,” Rain said after Sodo sat down, kneeling down next to him and opening the med kit. He carefully searched through it and eventually found a cleaning wipe. With dexterous and careful fingers he tore open the packet, pulled out the pristine white wipe, discarded of the packet, and then held out his free hand to Sodo. He looked up at him, “hand please.”
“Since you asked so nicely,” Sodo sighed sarcastically, almost throwing his bloodied hand into Rain’s open palm. He wasn’t looking at the water ghoul, not appreciating being babied so much and because of this he definitely wasn’t admitting that his finger actually did hurt, quite badly too.
“Now I’m going to start with just cleaning up the blood, but when I get to the actual wound it’s probably going to sting,” Rain explained as he gently and precisely started to wipe off the blood trails covering Sodo’s hand.
“Well obviously, I’ve had small cuts before. Even had them on my hands before!” Sodo sassed. His head was still angled away from Rain in protest, but every now and then he would glance down with his eyes to see how much progress had been made. He honestly was feeling a little nervous about how much it would sting.
“Alright that’s the excess cleaned up, there was more than I realised,” Rain explained as he discarded of the now bloodied wipe. “Gonna have to get another for the actual wound,” he continued, fishing out and opening up another cleaning wipe from the med kit.
“Ready?”
“What do you mean? Just d-OW! FUCK!” Sodo yelped as he yanked his hand away from Rain. He clutched onto his wrist and looked at Rain with an expression of outrage.
“I told you that it would sting,” Rain said calmly.
“Well… you pressed too hard, it made it hurt more!” Sodo said in an accusatory tone, desperately trying to excuse his reaction.
“Mhm, sure I did. Now, stop being a baby, come here,” Rain nodded, once again holding out his free hand, bending his fingers a couple of times in a beckoning motion. Sodo let out a huff before gingerly moving his hand towards Rain.
“Gently please. SSS-OW! I said gently!” Sodo hissed, twitching and fighting the urge to flinch away again. His other hand gripped the chair tightly, and his tail squirmed with every twinge and sting of pain he felt.
“Hell’s teeth I am being gentle,” Rain said, briefly glaring up at Sodo before continuing.
Sodo couldn’t help but feel bad. Rain sounded genuinely annoyed, which wasn’t something that really happened very often. All he was trying to do was help, and what had Sodo done in return? Been unco-operative and snappy. Rain didn’t need to do this, and yet the water ghoul had chosen to wrangle Sodo into being taken care of. Sodo sighed, deciding to keep quiet and resist flinching as best as he could.
After a pause, Rain spoke up, “I’m not mad, by the way.”
“Huh?”
“I’m not mad at you.”
“I-I didn’t think you were.”
“It’s okay, I know it’s your instinct to be defensive about things. You’re the mean tough guy!” Rain chuckled. “It’s actually something I really like about you, you’re as stubborn as a goat,” Rain said softly, continuing to clean Sodo’s finger, not looking away from it. Sodo felt a warmth in his cheeks and he quickly looked away, not wanting Rain to see his reddening face.
“That’s- uh…” Sodo faltered. Rain chuckled again, a radiant and affectionate smile on his face.
“Makes sense that you’re not very good with compliments,” Rain said, his tone still soft and gentle. He seemed satisfied with how clean the wound was, so he got rid of his second blood covered wipe and once again rummaged in the med kit. Sodo noted how carefully and precisely Rain always did small mundane things, interacting with objects as if he didn’t want to hurt them in any capacity.
Rain picked out a plaster of the right size and unwrapped it. It was black, decorated with the number six as if they were red polka dots. Rain let out a little exhale of a laugh upon seeing it, remembering how weirdly excited Copia had gotten when he found them, and how he immediately made sure that every med kit was fully stocked with all sizes of them.
“It’s okay though, not everyone can take compliments well. It’s just who some people are, but I know that they always take them to heart regardless, even you,” Rain continued as he lined the plaster up so it fully covered the wound, and then once he was happy, he very lightly stuck it to Sodo’s finger. Sodo had remained looking away the entire time, chewing on his bottom lip as Rain talked.
Suddenly Sodo’s breathing faltered as he felt Rain plant a quick and soft kiss onto his now covered finger. His other hand, which had relaxed while Rain was sorting out the plaster, tightened back around the seat it was resting on, claws digging into the wood. His lip almost started bleeding with how hard his fangs were biting down into it. Sodo’s whole body had tensed up, completely not used to any kind of gentle affection.
“Alright, you’re all fixed! Now look after that finger please, I don’t fancy having to deal with your whining again,” Rain said, standing up and packing up the med kit. Sodo wasn’t sure whether Rain had noticed his reaction to the little kiss, but if Rain had then he was hiding it very well.
“Oh, uh well I don’t think I whined that much,” Sodo said, shoving out a scoff in an attempt to appear relaxed. Rain spluttered out a laugh.
“Nah, of course you didn’t. Anyway, look after yourself, please,” he commanded, pointing a finger at Sodo as he started to walk away, off to put the med kit back where it was kept.
“I’ll try!” Sodo replied with a smirk.
“You better!” Rain’s voice called back, playfully.
Once Sodo was sure that Rain had gone, he looked down at his hand. He bent his fingers, not seeing a single speck of blood left on them. He looked at the careful placement of the plaster that perfectly covered his cut. He noticed a couple of tiny damp spots from where Rain’s lips had been.
A smile curled up Sodo’s cheeks as he curled his hand into a fist and raised it to his chest, the blush returning.