Work Text:
Abbacchio stepped over the body of the goon he had just taken out, looking around frantically.
“Fugo!” he shouted. Where the hell had the kid gone? How had he lost sight of him that quickly? He vaguely remembered Fugo running off during the fight after one of the escapees, but he had been too busy with the rest of the man’s toughs to follow.
“Fugo, where are you?!” Anxiety started to roil in his stomach as he rushed through the hallways of the house, trying to figure out where Fugo might have ended up.
He finally found a door that had been left slightly ajar and flung it open, rushing inside.
He skidded to a stop, heart in his throat.
He was in a library—several books were scattered over the floor as if they had been flung around during the fight. There were the remnants of Purple Haze’s work on the other side of the room, but that was all secondary to Leone at the moment.
Lying crumpled against one of the bookcases was Fugo, a puddle of blood pooled under his head.
“Fugo! Fuck, no.”
Leone forced his legs to work, sprinting the last few meters to the kid’s side. He dropped, raising shaking hands as he felt his breath stutter in his chest, panicked gasps forcing their way out.
Abbacchio, he’s got a gun!
BANG
The sound of a body hitting the ground. Blood seeping across the floor…
Abbacchio clenched his hands hard enough to dig his nails into his palms. You don’t even know yet, you don’t know if he’s…
Leone forced air into his lungs, fought to steady himself, as he reached out, and pressed his fingers to Fugo’s throat, feeling for his pulse.
The healthy flutter under the pads of his fingers sent a wash of relief through him, though it still didn’t negate the fact that Fugo was bleeding.
It didn’t negate the fact that Leone had nearly gotten another partner killed because he couldn’t get to him in time.
He carefully probed Fugo’s head, pushing his bangs back until he found the bleeding gash on his forehead. He rummaged in his pockets for a handkerchief and pressed it to the wound to try and stop the bleeding. He hoped it was just a bump on the head and not a concussion.
He reached out with the intent of peeling Fugo’s eyelids open to check pupil dilation, but the kid’s eyes started to flutter open, and his lips parted with a groan.
“Hey,” Abbacchio said simply, trying to force a small smile so the kid wouldn’t realize how much he had been freaking out just a moment before.
Fugo blinked, cringing at the light. “Abba?”
~~~~~~~~~~
The blond came to consciousness, only to be greeted by shouting lights, the bright noise of his panicked breath, his teammate’s voice, and a throbbing pain. What had even happened…?
While his brain was still buffering, Fugo could remember a few things, at least. He had gone ahead of Leone, who had checked the other rooms for traps. It came to him in a trickle, then all at once:
The lights were off. Still, he could see a shadow. They appeared to be holding something small; gun-sized, it looked like. Pannacotta wasn’t willing to mess around, nor to wait to find out more.
The windows into this room were open, letting moonlight stream through. Pannacotta was too wired to notice anything else about the room, but this meant that Purple Haze could go and wreak havoc… within reason.
With a gurgle and a growl, the Stand emerged, running toward the figure. A squelching noise followed. Fugo was silently thankful that he didn’t have to see his Stand’s handiwork.
He called his Stand back into him. It had been a year or so since he’d gained this power, but even so, he couldn’t help but involuntarily shudder as that thing went back into his core. He worried he’d never get used to it.
He turned around to meet with Leone, to deal with the rest of the adversaries, only to be met by someone with a tire iron. A fleeting thought about the novelty of seeing one of those again for the first time in a while was swiftly cut off by said iron hitting his forehead, knocking him out cold.
…All in all, there were worse ways to wake up from being knocked unconscious, especially when infiltrating a rival gang’s stronghold. Still. He groaned, his forehead throbbing. The specifics could wait. He was injured.
Fugo looked above, meeting his older teammate’s eyes. They were filled with a combo of concern and… –No; he was just projecting. Abbacchio never looked anxious. That was Fugo’s job. He must have hit his head hard. Anyway…
“Abba…?”
A sigh of relief came from Leone, tinged with a small shudder. Fugo’s eyesight focused as he felt the grounding, gentle pressure of a handkerchief against what he presumed was the wound.
While it hurt to move around—his friend’s hey, take it easy, kid, swiftly ignored—he took an inventory of the scene: The lights had been turned on. In the distance, a mangled, partially-dissolved corpse. A gun stuck out of the viscera like a melting clock in a Salvador Dali painting. It was oddly beautiful, considering… Anyway, Purple Haze had succeeded. Near that corpse stood an opulent stairwell, reaching upward, leading to another balcony. Both on the balcony and on the floor where he’d collapsed were row upon row of books, stacked in towering book cases.
Against the walls were specimens of insects; primarily butterflies. Wings outspread, catching the moonlight with their infinitesimally small scales, their beauty almost made up for the cruelty of their capture. An unenviable fate: eternally resting in shadow-boxes, pinned into place for perpetuity. Trapped. Even in death, they couldn’t find peace; they were doomed to be spectacles.
Pannacotta could relate.
Something flat was against Fugo’s back; he reached behind him to find a book. Whatever was on it he didn’t register, since his thoughts stopped cold as soon as he’d realized: He had ended up in a library.
Of fucking course.
Fugo’s breath became shallow and his chest ached. A wave of that all-too-familiar panic began to set in. His brain registered that he wasn’t back at school, that he was not in danger of what he’d dealt with in the past. His body, on the other hand, went into autopilot.
Fugo glared at his teammate on reflex, hearing himself growl as he grabbed Leone’s wrist, clutching it hard. “Get me the fuck out of here. Now.”
Then, the anger ebbed away, beginning to be replaced by fear. His grip loosened. The teen couldn’t bear to look Leone in the eye, so he stared at the book he’d thrown out from behind his back, finally seeing the title: A Guide To The Proper Pinning of Specimens. Below it, an image of a gorgeous blue morpho butterfly, skewered with a single pin. The blond, seeing this, felt as if a pin were going through him, too, keeping him frozen as the room began to crowd in on him.
Fugo’s voice was small. “Please.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Abbacchio kicked himself into gear at Fugo’s frantic plea. He got his feet under him again and grabbed the kid’s arms, helping him slowly to his feet.
“Easy,” he murmured as Fugo gritted his teeth and swayed, bringing a hand to his head. Even so, he was already taking a step toward the door.
Leone obliged him and pulled Fugo’s arm around his shoulders so that it was easier to keep him upright. He didn’t miss the uncomfortable stiffness in Fugo’s body at the contact, but he wasn’t going to be offended by that either. He was, frankly, just glad the kid was conscious and seemed to be mostly alright.
He felt Fugo breathe a sigh of relief as soon as they stepped out of the library, but he kept going with the intent of leaving the house.
“We’ve got a first aid kit in the car,” he explained as he steered Fugo toward the door. “Everything else is finished here. We just have to call Bucciarati to organize a clean up.”
Fugo was silent, feet dragging, and, for a moment, Abbacchio worried that he would pass out again, but after a long pause, he said. “The mission…” he murmured. “I… I did well, right?”
Leone was so surprised at the words that he fumbled for the doorknob. Fugo was asking him if he did alright? When Abbacchio had been the one who had let the kid get separated from him and nearly killed?
“Yeah, Fugo, you did great,” he replied, angry that his voice trembled slightly. Fugo had sounded… so young, asking that. He was young, of course, but he never acted his age and that reminder now, of the fact that Abbacchio had literally left a child to face down a gunman alone, was really hitting him in the worst way possible.
Shit, get yourself together, he snapped inwardly as he fumbled for his car keys in his pocket and maneuvered Fugo the final stretch to the car.
He opened the passenger door and eased Fugo down. “Watch your head.”
Fugo slumped in the seat and Abbacchio headed around to the trunk of the car to grab the first aid kit.
He came back around the car and crouched in front of Fugo. “Alright, let’s see your head. First, I want to make sure you don’t have a concussion.”
Fugo cringed as Abbacchio found a small flashlight and shone it in his eyes.
“Well, luckily, it doesn’t look like you’re concussed,” he said, relieved. “But you’re still bleeding a lot, so let me see what I can do about that.”
His hands were still shaking as he tried to find some gauze and antiseptic to clean some of the blood off of Fugo’s face. Why couldn’t he be professional about this, dammit? He had already determined Fugo would likely be fine; there was no need for him to wallow in his guilt.
Except there is, because you know you should have been there to watch his back, and it could have been worse. Maybe next time, it will be.
The thoughts wouldn’t leave his head.
“Shit,” Abbacchio hissed as he fumbled the bottle of antiseptic, nearly dropping it on the ground.
“—Abbacchio?”
He glanced up, feeling a pang of regret as he realized Fugo was watching his struggle. “Yeah?” he asked shortly.
“Are you alright?”
~~~~~~~~~
“Yeah.”
It was curt, sharp. Leone was not, in fact, all right.
Fugo, only then looking into Abbacchio’s eyes and seeing how they were slightly-glazed, distant in a regretful memory,knew that look. It was the same way he must have looked moments earlier, surrounded by the books and the butterflies and the blood. But, to see that expression in Leone’s eyes felt wrong. Uncanny. Yet… he wore that regret like an old pro.
Fugo had clasped so hard onto Leone when he had found him that there were small bruises beginning to form. He’d said that Fugo had done good just to be nice. He’d fucked up. Hurt someone who was trying to help. Not that that was new for him…
Before Leone could continue, the teen reached out, taking hold of his elder’s wrist once more, trying to avoid where he’d left a mark. This time, however, the grasp was steady. It was, in its own way, an apology, if Leone would allow it.
The look his elder gave him was… hard to parse. Abbacchio replied by silently dabbing a cotton swab with the antiseptic. A sharp, hissing pain followed. Fugo swore. However, whatever had been bothering Abbacchio had been pushed aside; at least, for now.
After a minute or so sitting in silence with only the sound of his teammate cutting and unwrapping gauze to put on the wound, Fugo finally spoke. “I’m sorry, for earlier. I just…” A sigh. He let go of Leone’s wrist, then looked down at his hands. Shame colored his cheeks. “Libraries are… tough, for me.”
“Don’t you like books?”
“I do, but…” He trailed off. “Sorry. It’s tough to talk about.”
“Don’t apologize, kid.” There was a fondness to his words that surprised Fugo, mingling with clear empathy. “I’m sorry, too.”
“For what?” Pannacotta leaned back as his partner went to put the first-aid materials away in the trunk of the car, leaving him to address the night air. “You’re not the one who got knocked out. I know you said I did good, but–”
Abbacchio’s voice was flinty. “Can’t you just take a damn compliment? You did good. End of story.” Then, getting into the driver’s seat, he slumped into his chair, leaning against the headrest. He appeared to be deep in thought; or, more precisely, deep in regret.
The two of them stewed in stubborn awkwardness before, after yet another long silence, Fugo took initiative to speak: “I’ll tell you what’s bothering me if you tell me what’s bothering you. Deal?”
A sigh. “...Sure, kid. All right. Hit me.”
He knew that what he would throw into the air would likely make his teammate think he was even more pathetic.
“...I used to love them; libraries.”
“Huh. Really.”
“Yeah. We had one in our house. I spent hours there.”
“That’s the most rich-kid-ass shit I’ve ever heard.” A smirk, accentuated by that dark lipstick of his.
“Ah, fuck off.” There was no anger in it, though; he smiled, nudging Abbacchio’s arm. “Anyway, you wanna know why I can’t do libraries anymore?”
“Only if you’ll tell me.”
The boy’s eyes went wide as he gasped. It was strange; Abbacchio always knew exactly what to say to disarm him. Still, despite Fugo’s own surprise, the offer–no, the fact that he’d been explicitly given a choice–was enough to stoke courage in his heart. Still, he looked at the car dashboard, fearful at the disappointment that he knew would be in his teammate’s eyes, as he confessed: “...My professor had a library in his office.”
“Shit. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be; if anything, it’s… nice, to finally say it aloud.”
“No wonder you were…”
“—Yeah.”
The gravity of this lingered for a long while, as did silence. However, it was broken when Abbacchio spoke next, words heavy.
“Fine; I’ll bite. I thought I didn’t get to you in time. Like… when I was on the force.”
Fugo had seen the news: Crooked Cop’s Bribes Kill Partner. Only later did he see the crime scene photos, which Bucciarati had asked him to find, back when he’d been considering adding the disgraced cop to their burgeoning team.
“But you did.”
It was Abbacchio’s turn to be taken aback. A small smile: “...Yeah. I guess I did.”
As if possessed, the boy reached over the cupholders in the middle of the car, smothering his friend in a hug.
“...You did good too, Abba.”
A long pause followed, only for Leone to hug Pannacotta back, and hug him tight.
“...Thanks, kid.”