Archive of Our Own

Scar

How long ago was it…over three months now…

Scar considered as he looked down from the rooftop at the rift Grian had plunged through. 

The tremors had stopped, and considering how closely that’d coincided with the reappearance of Hot Guy running along the skyline, he’d found himself receiving all the credit without meaning to. The people were behind him more than ever. 

Scar took it as acceptance in its own way. 

Maybe this time, he didn’t need to reattach the strings. 

I took that shot.

He looked down at his hands, his fingers loosely curled around his bow, and the other around a grappling arrow. 

It hadn’t felt good. No, not at all. 

But I had to do it. There was no way I would let him tear us all down again. 

Who was to say he hadn’t succeeded the first time? 

Maybe Scar had taken the shot to late? 

Stop that!

He shook his head firmly and forced a slow exhale. He couldn’t let himself get dragged down by those fears again. Not yet. 

His heart was heavy, and he swallowed the tightening anxiety as he gazed over the rift again.

The pulsating red that had once been visible was gone, and the faux bedrock was a noticeably lighter color, with less of a sparkle, than the real stuff. He hadn’t noticed any distinct change in any of the rifts he knew of that were visible from the surface, although there weren’t many, but it was causing him to feel a rising terror.

Concern.

That he’d cut the strings too late. 

That the brilliant bright feather in the vial on the cord necklace, shut away in the drawer of his side table at home, would truly be a final memory. 

Shaking his head hard enough that his ears rang this time, he banished the thought and turned to head to the next sector for his patrol. As he dashed over the rooftops, he caught sight of something in the corner of his eye and snapped his chin to narrow in on it, his visor zooming.

No way.

He remembered so many times that sight gave him a groan of exhaustion after a long patrol, or a jitter of nerves as he calculated his approach.

Not today.

A grin broke over his face, and he let out a whoop of joy, changing direction to swing down onto the mostly deserted side street. The screams of the few passing pedestrians running in the opposite direction, some of them calling out encouragement to him for the upcoming fight as he passed, were like music. 

Like a memory he feared he’d never relieve, back before him in blazing color.

It was late evening, after the dinner rush, but ever since the end of the quakes and the reopening of the city, people had been out and about much more, even into the darkened hours.

He skidded to a stop on the asphalt and pulled his bow from his back.


“Man, you have no idea how happy I am to see you!” He cried out to the group of creepers scuttling their way out from a hole broken out the side of a lesser-used warehouse. 

Scar knocked three arrows, firing all at once. Three creepers died instantly on impact. 

“Where’d you come out from, huh? Must’ve been a pretty big rift, if there were this many of you!” He called as he bent his knees. His bracers hummed, and he launched upward, backflipping and landing atop a nearby lamppost. His cape fluttered out behind one shoulder as he struck a pose to keep his balance, and onlookers cheered for him. 

This used to be so commonplace…but they’d almost lost it. 

Apparently, everyone seemed to see that in this moment, and they reveled accordingly. 

Two more arrows loosed, two more creepers down. They kept coming, and instead of the irritation he’d have felt before, he only grinned wider.

“Yeah, yeah, just look at you! Ha!” He barked out, continuing to fire. 

He dropped nineteen creepers in all before they stopped emerging. He put in a call through his visor to Cub to report that a rift had been discovered under an abandoned warehouse.

“Nineteen?” His best friend's voice hummed in his ear. 

“Yeah. Gotta be a big rift.” Scar replied, and Cub made a quiet huff that almost sounded like satisfaction.

“Alright. I’ll note it down. Keep an eye out in the area for anything else.”

“Of course I will.” He fought hard to keep the tremble of joy from his voice as he spoke. 

He shouldn’t be happy the rifts were reopening, reintroducing the monsters to the city above. 

But a creeper was easily bigger than an average person, and nineteen of them had just crawled up here. 

If they’d gotten here, it meant routes were reopening. 

Routes mutants and hybrids might be able to fit through.

It was with this giddy feeling in his chest, hope soaring for the first time in so long, that he took off into the night again.

Not long later, he stopped a good old-fashioned robbery. The downtown was getting busier by the day, people reemerging as belief grew that the three-month-long nightmare was over. The tremors were gone, and life could return to normal. 

He waved to the cheering crowd as he fired a net arrow and trapped one of the robbers attempting to flee the jewelry store.

What a classic! 

He thought to himself cheerfully, all of a sudden overwhelmed with the budding chances. Happiness was pressing into the walls of his chest like an inflating balloon. Almost overwhelming after all these months of gloom.

His eyes ran over the waving, applauding crowd of onlookers, and he spotted a few pointing, some tensing, some calling out, and so he rounded.

Another robber had apparently escaped his notice and was leveling a pistol at him from the shattered store window. Scar calculated quickly, knowing he couldn’t dodge the bullet and let it fly into the crowd and potentially hit someone. He pulled an arrow from his quiver, already intent on shooting the bullet out of the air before it could reach him, a trick he’d pull a thousand times that always got a roar out of the crowd. His biotech enhancements combined with his visor to ensure his aim was true, but before he could loose, a shot rang out.

It wasn’t a gunshot. 

No…not quite.

Crackling energy rushed an inch past Scar’s ear, brushing by his bangs with residual heat like a caress of fingertips, making the dark brown strands flutter, and his eyes flew open wide behind his visor. 

The purple bolt struck the robber. His body seized like he was being electrocuted, and he collapsed forward over the windowsill, unconscious. His pistol skittered to the concrete.

Scar whirled around and stared, as slack-jawed as most of the crowd, at widely spread pink and black wings and glowing purple eyes, crouched balanced on a flagpole emerging horizontally from the building across the way.

“Still need me watching your back, Pretty Boy?” The voice called, high and ringing. 

Scar’s heart swelled uncontrollably, and he bit down on his lip to avoid calling out the name. He was grateful his visor concealed his eyes completely, because they were growing hot and misty with tears. Blurring his view into a swirl of pink and black. 

He swallowed hard.

“I-I…”

Keep it together…!

“I s-see you’re back from vacation, birdie! But it was alright, I h-had it handled!” He managed out.

The crowd watched with bated breath as the two of them continued to survey each other.

Cute Guy giggled, and Scar pricked his ears. He was able to hear it, the distinct tightness to the noise. Emotion coiling through his throat.

He’s here. He’s here.

“Do you? Were you about to pull a cool stunt? Didn’t mean to interrupt the show! Wanna get a do-over?” Grian replied, aiming his pistol at Scar and then suddenly yanking it upward as if he’d just fired it.

“…or maybe you’d rather take the hit?” He teased, tilting his head and grinning brightly, kicking a foot out over the edge of the flagpole as he rose again, spreading his wings.

Scar felt his heart skip a beat and knew his ears were burning.

Grian beat his wings once and glided down to land in front of Scar, heels clicking down onto the pavement one step, two steps, three steps closer.

He spun his pistol idly off his thumb before dropping it into its holster.

Scar wanted to throw his arms around him, cling to him, crush him to his chest, assure himself that he was real, and actually there, but he felt utterly frozen. Shock and relief surged beneath his scarred skin.

He folded his bow onto his back, straightening up. 

Purple eyes glowed from behind a darkened shadow that concealed the top half of Grian’s face as he leaned back, palms to the sky. 

“A’course, maybe I’m just jumpy, huh? I’ve been going stir-crazy, gotta stretch my wings.” 
He spread his black and pink glamor-dyed wings out further and then stepped close enough to clap Scar on the shoulder.

“Guess I’ll see ya next time you need some covering fire, hm?” 

Scar’s eyes widened when he felt the squeeze of Grian’s fingers on his shoulder, and then the avian took a step back and beat his wings, lifting off from the street.

“Nitey-nite!” He blew a kiss, and the crowd roared. 

Scar felt himself growing further scarlet as frantic questions and voices filled the air around him, overwhelmingly positive at seeing Cute Guy return. 

He hurried to excuse himself and jumped up to the rooftop with several perpendicular leaps off the walls of the buildings. Once he’d landed on a quiet roof access, he reached up and pulled at the shoulder of his costume.

A note had been tucked under the edge of his cloak, and he pulled it free, quickly unfolding it with shaky hands.

I missed you. Gotta put in an appearance for PR’s sake, but I’ll be quick. I’ll be at your apartment in an hour. 

The familiar, beautiful penmanship went blurry when tears briefly burned in his vision, but they weren’t the agonies of struggling indecision.

Relief and happiness charged through him, and he carefully tucked the note into one of the pockets on his utility belt before he took a running start and threw himself into the night sky, pulling his bow from his back to fire another grappling arrow. As he jumped, he let out a crowing shout of delight that broke from his lungs almost breathlessly. 

An hour couldn’t go by fast enough.

And surely it couldn’t, because he arrived back at his apartment within forty minutes, unable to bear the thought of Grian getting there before him. 

He showered, changed, and fed Jellie. Rolled into the kitchen and watched the clock, rummaged in the fridge to make sure he had something for them to eat. 

He checked the clock again, and a wry smile tugged against his lips.

What did I expect? He’s always late…

So Scar made his way to his window and unlatched it, gently pushing the pane up and letting the nighttime breeze inside. He looked out over the skyline. It was a pretty good view from his apartment. A nice building close to campus and his uptown tech lab, fondly nicknamed the Hot Cave. 

For a few seconds, he let his eyes scan the street below before he shook his head, but the wry smile didn’t fall.

He settled onto the couch, grabbed the remote, and put on one of his favorite baking shows. He’d fallen behind on the newest season, having not been in the mood to watch it these past three months. The episode preview had just concluded when he heard the quiet clicking of heels hitting the wooden floor, and the familiar rustle of feathers. 

He smiled again, recognizing how shushed they were attempting to be. He listened a couple of seconds more, to the soft little taps of heels on hardwood. The gentlest rush of fluttering feathers, drawing in and flexing out. 

He could imagine it all like he’d seen in half-asleep dreams, half-awake nightmares for three months now.

“I can hear you, ya know?” He said aloud, pausing the TV.

“...spoilsport.” Came the voice back, almost petulant.

He took a deep breath.

Three months.

Like he was bracing himself.

So many sleepless nights.

And then…

Let me have him back, for all I’ve done.

…put an arm over the back of the couch and looked.

Just in time to see the shimmering of glamor fade, and the window pane being pulled down. 

Brilliant red, yellow, and blue feathers filled his vision till Grian turned around again. Light brown bangs, windswept from flying, still wearing his Cute Guy uniform. The darkened shadow he used to conceal his face faded away as he pushed back the pink hood of his cropped hoodie with the hand-stitched version of the Hot Guy logo, rounded to look like a heart. 

“...S-Scar.” His voice stuttered and stuck as he stood there, so close, so overwhelmingly bright, humming and flickering over the last syllable just like Scar had always adored.

There he is.

“There’s my Birdie.” He breathed, and he saw Grian’s chest hitch on a breath some his eyes brighten with tears as he sniffled once. 

“B-Been…been a minute, huh?” He whispered. 

And Grian wasn’t a daydream anymore.

“Gri!”

Scar, in a sudden rush of emotion, pushed to stand, but his bracers had been rough considering the extra work he’d been putting in these past two weeks, and he barely managed to rise a few inches before they gave out, and he dropped back onto the couch again. 

Not like he had to get up, though, because Grian came to him. 

“Scar!”

Easily jumping over the back of the couch, vaulting it to tuck his legs underneath to land beside him, bouncing once on the cushions and tossing his arms around his neck. Hugging so tight the man momentarily got the wind knocked from him. 

Scar gasped, eyes burning, and returned the embrace tightly, arms coiling around the long roots of his wings.

“I missed you, I missed you, I missed you!” Scar murmured repeatedly, his cheeks already wet with tears as he pressed kisses, sloppy and frantic, against the avians jaw.

“Missed you too.” Grian managed in reply, his voice shaking as his hands pawed over Scar’s broad back, seeking over him like he was trying to make sure this was real, too, and all the while he tilted his head back to give Scar the space to put his lips wherever he wanted them. 

Which was everywhere. 

But that was a separate point.

“I…Scar I…!” 

“I’m here.”

“I know you’re here.”  

He didn’t sound like he was keeping it together well, either.

Not like it mattered. They were alone together. There was no need to hold anything back.

Scar raised his hands to land on Grian’s shoulders, pushing him back enough to see him properly. 

Dark eyes, light brown hair, and a wobbly smile that was drenched either side with bright tears falling from big dark eyes. 

Grian’s arms around his neck didn’t loosen, the tension awkward and stiff, but Scar wouldn’t dare complain of it. 

Not after he’d come so close to losing it all.

Scar took a shaky breath. “I’m so sorry it took me so long, I didn’t…I was…”

“Hey, hey, it’s ok. I’m here.” Came the immediate reply, one of Grian’s hands came up to card against his hair.

He let out a choked, watery giggle. “We’re both here.” 

Then he leaned forward against Scar’s hands on his shoulders and kissed him. It lingered a few seconds, almost clumsily, like they were re-familiarizing themselves with the sensation, and the touch, and the sparking emotions.

They broke apart just as slowly, and Scar found all the tension he’d been carrying for these long three months was sloughed off his shoulders.

“I’m here. We’re here.” Grian repeated softly, like he didn’t believe it himself.

“Yeah. Yeah, you are. Yeah, we are.” He murmured in reply.

They stayed like that a second longer, till Jellie made her presence known by jumping up onto the couch behind Grian and bumping against his thigh.

“Jellie!” He let go of Scar and sat back, landing in his lap as he reached down and scooped up the cat.

“I missed you too! I did!” He insisted, peppering her white and gray face with kisses.

Scar pouted. “How come she gets more kisses than me?” 

Grian looked back at him, warm fondness mixed with amusement, still crying, the tiny wings on either side of his head swaying with unbearable fondness.

“She’s cute.”

“I’m not cute!?” Scar demanded petulantly, and Grian laughed. The sound high, ringing and pitchy, and stars above Scar loved it. 

His apartment felt full again with that sound bouncing off the walls.

“I thought we established this? You’re pretty.” Grian replied, eyes briefly sparking purple. 

Scar let his arms fall around his waist, pulling him in firmer. His thumbs traced the lines of his boyfriend's hips through the tight fit of the black shirt he wore for his hero uniform. 

Grian’s wings folded neatly into a heart shape, his shoulder settled against Scar’s chest.

He finally released Jellie, who’d been cradled in his arms, and she jumped down to snuggle into the opposite corner of the couch. 

“Besides, no one ever said you wouldn’t be getting more kisses.” Grian tacked on, turning his head to the side to catch Scar’s cheek, cupping it with one hand and pulling them together again. Lips met in a desperate press, Scar could taste the salt from tears, and he didn’t know whose they were. He didn’t care. All that mattered was this small bright warmth in his arms. 

A few more minutes were spent getting reacquainted before Grian’s wandering fingers brushed against the cord.

“What’s this? You never wear jewelry.” Grian commented, tugging at the cord.

Scar felt his ears burning and sputtered. “U-Um, I…it’s just, I mean, y’know, like trying something new and…hey, hey, wait!”

He couldn’t get his arms untangled from behind Grian, settled beneath the roots of his wings, till it was too late, and his boyfriend had fished up the vial from beneath his shirt.

For a second, he stared at it, like he was processing what exactly it was, and then he made a pleased trill in his throat. His eyes glowed purple with a warm, smoldering light.

Scar had gotten used to some of Grian’s more bird-like tendencies, and he’d heard this sound a few times. He knew it was a good one.

Grian ran his thumb over the vial softly. “…you’ve been wearing it?”

Scar chuckled awkwardly. “Uh, yeah, it…I mean, once I found it. Took me three months.” 

The avians dark eyes snapped up to meet his again, eyes wide. “Three months? But I left it in your baking drawer!” 

Scar nodded. “Yeah, I…I wasn’t much in the mood to bake…but I found it. And…and when I found it, it made me think…that I really needed to fix all this.” 

Grian tilted his head quizzically. “We were completely off the grid down there; all communication went down within the first forty-eight hours. I have no idea what happened topside.”

“It’s a long story.”


“I’ve got time.” 

Scar nodded gently, and Grian let go of the vial with the feather in it to fall and rest on his collarbone.

As close as he could manage. 

“…you’ve got time. Yeah. Yeah, we’ve got time.” Scar said, as if to convince himself of the fact. 

“It’s just…a lot.” 

Grian twisted in his lap, then he replaced his arms where they’d been comfortably threaded around Scar’s neck, pulling himself just a fraction closer. 

“Then how about we don’t worry about it tonight, hm? Let it be tomorrow's problem, I say.” 

Scar’s eyes brightened and he nuzzled his forehead against Grian’s. Started humming a few bars of some nonsense song just to hear the avian trill softly again. 

“Tomorrow's problem sounds amazing to me.” 

“You’ve got yourself a deal, Pretty Boy.” 

Scar’s hands slid up to run adoringly between Grian’s wingroots, and he felt him melt into the touch. Still tear-streaked, he smiled brighter than he had in three long months. 

And he’d let problems stay in tomorrow. 

Just for now.