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“What the fuck is this?”
Robert had expected the rest of the Z-team to come back straight to the SDN for lunch break; he knew how cranky some of them could get with an empty stomach, if the way Punch Up had, well, punched his way through to the break room ten minutes ago was anything to go by. Only a couple of the girls and Waterboy had been missing, busy with the villain of the week who was desperate for a bit of attention his parents never gave him as a child. Robert had grown accustomed to this kind of routine.
What he hadn't expected, however, was for the small group to come back with a bloody, disheveled-looking Waterboy barely standing on his feet.
“'This is Waterboy, duh,” Malevola scoffed. “You blind or something?”
“I had nothing to do with this,” Prism chimed in.
“I mean—why is he covered in blood? The last mission went smoothly as far as I've heard.”
“Well…almost smoothly.”
“Yeah, Waterbabe got into a bit of a situation. But it got resolved, so no harm, right?”
Behind Malevola, Invisigal rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. Like the rest of the team, the demon didn't elaborate and just offered him an awkward smile, her grip tightening on Herman's hip so he wouldn't slip. Poor guy looked like he was about to drop on his ass right then and there, and he tried not to stare at him for too long.
“No harm? Have you seen him!?”
“Ah—it's not—nothing, really!” Herman stuttered, his voice more high-pitched than usual. “I'm ok—fine! I'm fine!”
“Yeah, you look stellar.” Robert sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Come on, let’s go to the infirmary.”
Malevola gladly let Robert take hold of Herman, his arm replacing hers around his slender waist and supporting his weight. He was close enough that he heard the small, pathetic yelp the hero let out at the change and tried to ignore the feeling of his sleeve getting wet.
“I'm sorry, are you a nurse?” Invisigal scoffed, quiet until now.
“Yeah, well, the actual nurse isn't here today, and I'm not going to let him walk around looking like roadkill.”
“Fuck. That's harsh, even from you.”
Robert rolled his eyes and turned to the other girls, an eyebrow arched. “I'm guessing no one else here volunteers to patch him up, anyway?”
As their only answer, the three of them scattered around the office, paying no mind to the two men. Robert let out a longer, deeper sigh—if that was even possible.
“Come on, Herm,” he muttered, nodding for the hero to follow him, and he was given no resistance.
Although Herman was in poor shape, he was still standing straight and wasn't that much of a weight for Robert to carry—which, all things considered, wasn't that much of a shock. It was a wonder how the guy could remain so skinny while living with his grandma.
As soon as they stepped into the quiet infirmary, Robert helped the taller man sit on a chair and made sure he was comfortable before rummaging through the various closets and drawers, looking for anything that would make him feel better. He was no medical expert, but he had patched up his fair share of wounds back during his Mecha Man days and was confident he could at least be of assistance until he could see a real doctor.
Settling on some disinfectant, cloths, and bandages, he grabbed an ice pack on the way before crouching in front of Herman and gently pressing it against the swollen side of his face. He whimpered in pain for a second and closed his eyes, only to grab the pack to hold it himself.
“You r—really don't have to do this.”
“Your safety is one of my priorities; if you're hurt, it's my responsibility to take care of it.”
And, well, that wasn't entirely true; doing this was in no way, shape, or form his part of the job, but he couldn't leave the poor guy to his own devices after getting his ass handed to him—at least from the looks of it. He wouldn't have gone to such lengths if it were anybody else in his position.
As he let his eyes travel south, he noticed the many cuts and bruises through the holes in the fabric of his suit and winced. Oh, boy.
“I'm really sorry to ask, but could you take off your top? I want to make sure I don't miss anything.”
“If you insist…”
He really wasn't, but a part of him was eager to do so.
Robert struggled not to stare at Herman as he unzipped the top part of his wetsuit and stripped out of it, although he couldn't help but steal a glance from time to time. There was something endearing about his lankiness and the way he was slouched in the chair, almost trying to shrink into himself and make himself look smaller than what he really was, as if afraid to intimidate Robert with his mere height. But, really, he looked more like a newborn puppy confused by his surroundings.
He also kind of enjoyed how he looked after such a brutal beat-up, but that was a whole other can of worms to open for another day when he didn't have a half-naked cutie sitting in front of him. He seized Herman's goggles and pushed them out of the way so they could rest on top of his head.
“Sorry,” Robert apologized again.
Grabbing one of the cloths, he wetted it under the faucet next to them before running it over Herman's wounds to clean up the blood left on his pale skin—which wouldn't have been necessary considering the abnormal amount of water the hero was currently secreting, but he preferred to do things the proper way. The young man jumped at the feeling of Robert's gentle touch on his shoulder at first but leaned into it and let his coworker take care of him.
“How the hell did you even get all bruised up like that when everyone else looked fine? It's like your first day all over again.”
“I, uh—accidents happen! Do we really need to talk about it?” Herman chuckled nervously.
At this, Robert purposefully pressed one of his bruises on his arm, to which he hissed in pain and recoiled as much as he could.
“I think you owe me an explanation, yeah. Unless you want me to finish what Groundbreaker started?”
“Fine, fine! Just—stop doing this!” He whined.
When he got a nod in response, Herman put the ice pack back on his cheek and released a heavy breath.
“I… I tried t—to—I wanted to impress the team, so I kinda…sorta…jumped right in front of Ground—the villain.”
Wide-eyed, Robert paused in the middle of disinfecting one of his wounds to stare at him.
“You have got to be shitting me.”
“I thought I c—could take him!” Herman clarified, his voice bordering on a whine.
“Emphasis on 'thought,'” Robert said, rolling his eyes. “You guys were up against a fucker who can create earthquakes, Herm. What did you expect? For him not to crush you?”
Motioning for Herman to bend over, he grabbed ahold of his chin with one hand and took care of a cut on his forehead with the other. Despite being drenched, his skin felt much warmer than usual.
“You have to stop letting the team get to your head like that. They can be real assholes sometimes—well, most of the time, actually. What I mean is, don't listen to what they say about you, especially if they don't mean it.”
“Well, th—they were kind enough to not say—tell you what had happened until you asked.”
'Kind' wasn't the word he would have used, but Herman had a point; weeks ago, they wouldn't have hesitated to tell Robert what he had done and relentlessly mock him, or worse, leave him to fight Groundbreaker on his own. Now they at least had the decency to drag his ass back to the SDN and try to cover for his absolute idiocy.
With his hand still tucked under Herman's chin, Robert offered him a warm smile.
“I'm serious, Herm. You're a valuable part of this team, and you're much more competent than what you or the others seem to think. Don't start doing stupid shit to impress them; you know better.”
He lived for the way colors spread from his forehead to his sternum, bathing his entire face in red. He had always been so easy to fluster, but a part of Robert was proud of himself for doing so and excited to see him so responsive to his words.
“Y—You think so?”
“I know so. I'm very happy to have you on our side.”
Herman yelped again, pressing his lips together lest he would stutter on loop trying to get something out (and yes, Robert was speaking from experience.) His eyes were wide open and shining with wonder, boosted by Robert's words.
This was when he noticed Herman was slowly leaning in, his eyes fixed on Robert's mouth, and for a second, he contemplated not doing anything to stop him. His bottom lip had been busted, now red and swollen, and he had to fight the urge to kiss it better—he would have made things worse for sure, but the thought was nice. Their faces were inches away from each other, their breaths mingling together.
He really wanted to let it happen, to just give in and allow himself to empty his own head for a minute. Forget about his responsibilities for as long as Herman's mouth was on his; let his hands wander where they shouldn't have been.
But this was probably an HR issue in the making, and he wasn't looking forward to explaining to his managers why he tongued Waterboy in the nurse's office. Withdrawing his hand, he got back on his feet and stepped back to put some distance between them. He tried not to laugh at the way the hero almost fell forward as he had put most of his weight in his palm.
“Well, uh—“ Robert cleared his throat. “Go on about your day, and let me know if you need anything else. You might want to keep the ice pack for your lip, too.”
“Yes! Y—Yes, of course! Thank you so—a lot, Rob—Robert! Boss!”
Herman dressed himself up and nearly pushed him out of the way to leave the infirmary, apologizing over and over while doing so until he vanished down the hallway, leaving a wet trail behind him. The older man sighed and rubbed the back of his neck; well, at least it was nice while it lasted.
Fuck, he just realized he had kindly told him to fuck off before he was even done with the rest of his injuries. He'd have to ask Blazer to give him the afternoon off so he could rest.
“God, that almost made me gag.”
Robert jumped at the sound of a voice that hadn't been in the room so far and looked up to see Invisigal sitting on the nurse's desk, her arms crossed and a smirk plastered on her face, as if delighted to have caught the two of them like this.
“For the love of—“ Robert groaned. “Stop creeping on me!”
“It's not creeping; it's spying,” she corrected him. “Get it right.”
He rolled his eyes; that was all the same shit with her.
“Anyway, what's up with Waterbitch?”
“First of all, stop calling him that. Second, what do you mean, 'what's up'? You were there when he got his ass kicked, right?”
“Oh, no; I'm talking about all that,” she scoffed, gesturing at Robert. “Your puppy eyes and pep talk and shit. You guys were two seconds away from fucking on this desk.”
Robert hated to admit that he had thought about it at least once while he was tending to his wounds, but he would have rather blamed that on his erratic libido. He turned his back on her to put back the stuff he had used and clean the blood-stained cloth in the sink.
“I don't know what to tell you,” he muttered. “Our relationship is strictly professional.”
“Riiiight,” she trailed off. “Looking like you were about to jump his bones is very professional.”
Before he could defend himself, Visi got off from the desk and walked to the exit, bumping his shoulder on her way with a shit-eating grin.
“Call me when it happens; I wanna be here to make fun of you morons!”
“We're not—“ but Visi was already out the door, probably on her way to bother the next unfortunate soul who happened to cross paths with her. He sighed, looking at his own reflection above the sink.
Robert was no idiot; he knew what he was feeling, and he hated the way that Visi could not only read him like an open book but also took immense joy in shoving it in his face as well. He didn't need to be reminded of how stupid he acted around Herman, as if he was going through his first high school crush all over again.
Fuck—Waterboy, of all superheroes. He had Invisigal and Blonde Blazer swooning over him a while ago, and he did nothing about it, only for this wet rag of a man to sweep him off his feet without even trying. What the fuck was the matter with him?
At least Visi was somewhat good at keeping secrets when she wanted to; he could only imagine what would happen once Flambae found out about his stupid, silly crush on Herman.