Archive of Our Own

He camped out in the bamboo grove for six nights before the grunts finally decided to report it. Cinnamon's ghost fire kept him warm & let him cook without needing to build much of a proper fire, so he didn't leave much of a site behind during the day, but the eerie glow was obvious once the sun set, and eventually it was too much of a pattern to ignore.

"So you're telling me that the trainer who saved this entire city, including your sorry asses, has been roughing it on our very own roof for seven days and I'm only just now hearing about it?!"

The grunts kept their heads bowed in fearful submission, but one of them, either out of courage or pure stupidity, managed to squeak out, "W-with all due respect sir, Trainer Elliot has quite a few, uhm, unconventional habits… and we wanted to make sure we wouldn't be wasting either of your time if it turned out he was just conducting research for the Professor or something. Sir."

Corbeau sighed and pinched his brow in an attempt to stave off the inevitable tension headache. Somehow it was always infinitely more frustrating when nobody had done anything outright wrong, just mildly incompetent. He threw up a dismissing wave as returned to his desk to dig through a couple drawers. By the time he'd found and stowed away his quarry into a coat pocket and settled behind the desk, the grunts had made themselves scarce, and only Phillipe stood before the imposing desk.

"Is he still up there now?"

"No sir, at least not when I looked just now, but the sun is nearly set. It seems he just has a little base camp. Probably just for taking meals and sleeping. He's always gone by sunrise."

For a moment Corbeau was quiet as he digested this information. Whatever was going on, it was clearly a delicate situation, and he knew better than most how hard it could be to get a desperate person to accept help.

"Extend the guard outside the property line to keep eyes on the roof. I don't know if he'd be going out for the royale. Just call me as soon as—" thunk. It wasn't a particularly loud sound, given the level of security and soundproofing throughout the entire Rust Syndicate Building, but it had clearly come from the roof. Before either of them could take a single step towards the elevator to investigate, the sound of another, much more immediate commotion came crashing into the lobby downstairs.

"I'll take care of it, Boss. You head on up without me."

A light breeze rattled the bamboo as Elliot gently nudged another twig into the makeshift fire pit. Technically, Cinnamon could keep the ghost fire burning on his own all night if needed, but there was so much burnable junk all over Lumiose that it was easier for Elliot to just scavenge a few bundles of scrap than literally burn his typhlosion's life energy all night. That said, the sparks and pops from damp wood never got any less startling, and when a particularly large ember suddenly came flying directly at him, the resulting flinch had him fully airborne for just a moment before landing heavily on the gravel.

Laika, for her part, did her due diligence as a service pokemon and ran over to give her human partner a thorough sniff-over and check his aura. Once she decided he was unharmed though, she let out a small annoyed huff and returned to her post by the railing to continue people watching, which was apparently much more interesting all of a sudden.

Elliot settled back into his seat near the fire and stared into the dancing flames. The bright orange color was quickly dissipating as its fuel burned up and Cinnamon's darker purple ghost flames reclaimed dominance in the small gravel pit. These were almost silent, especially compared to the rowdy wood fire, but Elliot knew that in dead silence, there would be whispers coming from the fire. They were incomprehensible as words, but unmistakable as language. Leaning in, Elliot wondered, not for the first time, if he would ever hear any familiar voices in the flames.

And then there were paws on his face, obscuring the flames and pressing him back away from the fire. It took a few moments for Elliot to fully come out of his fugue state — he let out a frustrated groan and gave Laika a reassuring pat on the head.

"Thanks Lai, I'm ok now."

She kept a wary eye on him for a little longer, before finally letting out a satisfied bark and settling back on the other side of the fire pit.

Elliot tossed a few sticks into the flames and did not notice the light crunch of gravel behind him.

"If you're trying to burn my building down you're doing a pretty awful job."

He startled hard enough to topple over slightly, and looked up over his shoulder to see a thoroughly unimpressed Corbeau gazing down at him.

"Jeez man," he muttered, "Don't sneak up on me like that."

"I was hardly sneaking," he scoffed, and extended a hand to help him to his feet. "And I would think someone who doesn't want to be found would be a little more aware of their surroundings."

"Yeah…thanks." Elliot accepted the hand up, but couldn't meet Corbeau's gaze.

"What are you doing up here, El? Even if it's a bit of a dump, I can hardly believe my roof is a more comfortable place to sleep than that hotel."

"I'm sorry, I… didn't think I'd be up here this long. I'll be out of your hair soon, promise." He made to turn away, but a firm hand on his arm stopped him in place.

"Not what I asked. Don't be foolish. Where's the rest of your Team MZ?"

Elliot's expression tightened, and the firelight cast his face into deep shadow as he shrugged off Corbeau's hand. "MZ has been disbanded." When no response came, he continued. "Jett stepped down as CEO of Quasartico and decided to hire her granddaughter as her replacement."

"Granddaughter…?"

"Yep. Taunie finally found her big mystery person — such a touching family reunion," he explained through bitter sarcasm. "In fact, she was so eager to jump straight into her new job that she couldn't even be assed to come back to the hotel to tell anyone! Oh, but don't worry," he let out a somewhat hysterical laugh, "Naveen called her, and of course he and Lida can keep living there until they find an apartment. And obviously I can stay for the rest of my vacation."

At that point Cinnamon had shuffled over to sit directly in the fire pit and nuzzled into Elliot's side, hoping to soothe his agitated trainer.

Corbeau was quiet for a long moment, processing this new information. When he finally spoke, it was one of the last things Elliot had expected.

"So, you never told them you're not just some tourist on vacation?"

"I— what?"

"Oh please, for starters you've been here for months, and you're not exactly some billionaire's kid on some sort of bullshit self discovery journey. And besides that, I know what it looks like when someone doesn't have anywhere else to go."

Elliot just stared in stunned silence. His jaw flexed uselessly as he tried and failed to come up with some retort, but as he felt his eyes begin to water, he instead spun around and stalked to the railing at the edge of the roof.

He was grateful for the darkness of the fresh night and the soft red light as the battle zones flickered to life below. He pressed his palms hard into his eyes and scrubbed at his face as he tried desperately to rein his expression back into control.

After a polite minute to let Elliot collect himself, Corbeau padded over to lean on the railing next to him — not quite touching, but close enough to feel the proximity crackling like static between them. After a moment of pocket digging, he gently nudged Elliot's arm and held out an offering.

Through blurry vision in dim lighting, all Elliot could discern was a white stick being offered to him, and with a fuzzy mind full of too many emotions, what ended up coming out of his mouth was, "I, uh, don't smoke."

Corbeau didn't miss a beat, spinning the object in his hand before proffering it anew, "Neither do I, that shit's poison to the body."

A small yellow lollipop. Elliot took it and could barely suppress the fit of giggles that suddenly came upon him. Because of course big bad Rust Syndicate Boss Corbeau had a pocket full of candy. He probably had a whole stash down in his Big Important Desk. When he'd finally collected himself, Elliot noticed Corbeau pulling out another lollipop, presumably for himself. He leaned in close, ignoring any considerations of personal space, and tried reading the wrapper in the dark, but only succeeded in earning a gentle flick to the head.

"Don't get greedy, you got yours."

"Just making sure you're not holding out on me."

For a few minutes they just stood there in comfortable silence, listening to the sounds of the city below. When Elliot finally spoke, he kept his eyes on the tower in the distance.

"Y'know I knew someone once that always said that the 'where you're from' that you tell people isn't necessarily where you're born — it's wherever you've lived the longest. I like to use that since it means I can technically say I'm from Hisui-era Sinnoh."

To Corbeau's credit, he kept his surprise limited to very raised eyebrows. "Well, that wouldn't have been my first guess."

Elliot threw his hands up in mock frustration, "It never is! People have such a narrow view of what someone who grew up without modern electricity looks like!" He did his best to keep a straight face, but when he finally caught the other man's eye, that sneaky little smile made him crack and he burst out laughing.

"So that would make you, what? Two, three hundred years old?"

"Oh, nah, still just thirty," Elliot waved dismissively, "I got ripped out of time and space. You know, the whole 'chosen by arceus' thing. Before that I was just a… weird, sad teenager in Unova, and before that a weird, happier kid in Hoenn." He sighed wistfully before continuing, "But yeah, steep learning curve — thankfully the language got beamed into my head, but it was actually a pretty decent decade of life. And then just when I was finally settling down and getting comfortable, I get a message that 'it's time to return'… Cinnamon was the only one to come with me."

He grew quiet as the tightness in his chest returned, his head began to spin, and his vision started to grow blurry again. But a soothing hand came up to rub across his shoulders, grounding him, and the pain began to retreat. Elliot took a deep, steadying breath and leaned into the touch.

"So if you were taken from Unova, I assume you were sent back there — how'd you end up all the way over here in Lumiose?"

"Oh, yeah, I had been living with my parents before everything and, well, they didn't exactly roll out the welcome wagon when I came back.

"My father… as far as he was concerned, his precious little girl was still missing, and he couldn't give less of a shit about the person that did come back. My mom did as fine as she could, but once she found out how everything happened, with arceus and all… I don't really know, but I think something in her head just sorta snapped. And with my own head shit on top, I just couldn't stay there."

"Your own head shit?"

Elliot nodded and tapped the side of his head, "Turns out the human brain does just fine going backwards in time, but for some people, going forward kinda fucks your shit up.

"It's called Temporal Displacement Syndrome. Obviously there's not a ton of cases, so it's really just what they call any brain issues that crop up after time travel. Sometimes it's just psychological stuff, sometimes neurological. I got lucky and ended up with both."

He let out a humorless laugh. "Anyway, I had to get out of Unova, and there ended up being a doctor that studied TDS at Naranja Academy in Paldea. The school has this open study program, so it was a pretty good place to figure out how to be a modern adult at my own pace. They paired me with Laika as a service pokemon — she started as a riolu so she could focus on learning to read and support my aura, keep an eye on things, all that. We graduated a few months ago, and, well, I didn't really have much of a plan, so I just packed a bag, hopped on a train, and hoped for the best."

Elliot stretched and sighed, "And that's the tragic backstory."

Corbeau twirled his lollipop stick while he gazed over the city. "Damn, chosen by arceus itself and the savior of Lumiose?" He nudged his shoulder playfully, "Sounds like you're a pretty big deal."

He chuckled lightly and shrugged, leaning into the touch. "Pfft, I mean maybe. I'm just doing the best I can wherever I end up. A dandelion floating on the wind."

Neither of them moved as the conversation faded away into the sounds of the nighttime city. Each quietly reveled in the warm presence at their side.

"So, are you going to let me help you in a normal way, or are you going to put me to work to come up with some convoluted blackmail to get you to sleep under a roof?"

Elliot rolled their eyes. "You know I could never afford your rent."

"Obviously. That's why I'm not offering on behalf of the Rust Syndicate — I'm offering as your friend."

When Elliot didn't respond, Corbeau wrapped a firm hand around his shoulders and steered him away from the railing. "Come on, it's getting late, and I still need to start dinner."

The apartment was nowhere near as extravagant as the business end of the building, but it was no less elegant. Elliot only had time for a few glances as Corbeau guided him through the apartment, but it was considerably nicer than anywhere he had lived.

The door they finally arrived at opened to a changing room, and then to a truly massive bathroom. It was Johto-style, with a sunken bathing area larger than Elliot's room at Hotel Z, and a waist-high tub across the entire back wall. Elliot turned to see Corbeau coming out of the first room with a laundry basket.

"I'll bring you a change of clothes. Leave all your laundry — not just what you're wearing. There's a few different kinds of human and pokemon shampoo by the faucet. I'm gonna start making dinner, but it'll take a while, so no rush."

"Wait, we're not eating first?"

Corbeau put a hand on his shoulder and smiled gently, but his tone was blunt. "Normally yes, but right now you smell like you've been living on somebody's roof for a week."

Elliot let Cinnamon and Laika out of their balls, and they both started to explore the new environment while Elliot sorted out his dirty clothes and started to figure out the faucets. Cinnamon was particularly interested in the bathtub, even letting out a few excited dooks, and Elliot realized they hadn't had a proper open shower and hot bath like this since returning to modern times. Sure, they had had plenty of baths, but western tubs were shallow, and nowhere ever seemed to have enough of the near-scalding hot water that Cinnamon preferred.

While the tub began to fill, Laika found and brought over the various soaps and shampoos. Most of them were heavy floral and fruit scents that threatened to give Elliot a headache straight out of the bottle, but he did manage to find a less overwhelming charcoal and coffee wash for himself, as well as a lighter floral pokemon shampoo.

Between washing and soaking, they took over two hours bathing — in large part because nobody wanted to get out of the tub to dry off, so Elliot took the chance to get some incredibly cute and cozy pictures.

In the connecting room, Elliot found a classy set of button-down, short-sleeved silk pajamas, along with what seemed to be brand new socks and underwear. The pajamas were a medium green, embroidered along the edges with black and purple roses. Elliot tried not to fixate on how well they fit as the smooth fabric slid over his skin — he and Corbeau were mostly the same size, so obviously his clothes would fit, it wasn't that deep.

In the kitchen, Elliot found Corbeau seasoning some cut up chicken while pasta boiled on the stove. He looked up and his gaze immediately darkened.

"Your hair is still wet."

"Hm? Oh, yeah. My hair and blow dryers don't get along — it'll turn into an insane dandelion poof from all the static, so it's better to just let it air dry."

But Corbeau was already washing his hands, "Absolutely not. Living outside for a week has probably already wrecked your immune system enough as it is, and I'm not having you getting sick on me."

Elliot rolled his eyes, but allowed himself to be shoved back into the bathroom. He sat on a stool while the other man tended to him. Cool air rushed around him while deft fingers carded systematically through his hair, and it was all he could do to not make any embarrassing noises. All too soon, Elliot's hair was dry and, exactly as he predicted, haloed around his head like something from a hair metal band.

He let out a groan at the sight in the mirror, "Do you at least have a hair tie or a bandana or something?" Corbeau hummed his assent and told Elliot to go check on the pasta. Elliot didn't see his wide, giddy grin as he walked away.

Dinner was excellent. It was a simple pasta dish with white sauce, chicken, and vegetables, and Elliot did not think about how it definitely didn't take two hours to cook. They ate quietly for a few minutes, when Corbeau spoke up casually, not even looking up from his phone.

"Your laundry should be done soon; there's plenty of space in my closet for you to put everything."

Elliot froze, and as anxiety flickered to life in his chest, he couldn't help but let his thoughts start to spiral. He knew it wasn't entirely reasonable, but it was getting out of hand. It was one thing to accept dinner and a bath. Putting his stuff away meant staying long term, it meant getting comfortable.

"Why are you doing all this?" Elliot's voice was quiet, but Corbeau's head snapped up immediately. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

Elliot couldn't meet his sharp gaze as a familiar sense of guilt started to wash over him. "You've done so much, I can't impose on you more than this…"

Corbeau sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. He stood silently, came around to Elliot's side of the table, and spun his chair around to face him.

"Why the hell would I not help someone who needs it?"

Elliot scoffed and still couldn't look him in the eye. "I don't deserve all this—"

Hands slammed on the table on either side of Elliot's seat; the noise startled him into looking up to see Corbeau's face just inches from his own.

"Don't. Be. An idiot" he growled. "Have you even considered for a moment that I might just genuinely care about you and like having you around? That your company is more than enough compensation for whatever burden you think you're imposing on me?"

Elliot couldn't form words. Nobody had ever said anything so… violently affectionate to him before. And so close. A thousand different emotions rose in his chest, but the one at the forefront was starting to look like basic panic.

Seeing his reaction, Corbeau softened and backed off a bit. One hand came up to lightly brush the side of Elliot's face, and he didn't flinch away.

"I'm sorry," he murmured. "I get it, I've been there, but the world isn't over just because you have to rely on people, I promise."

Elliot still doesn't respond, so he steps away and returns to his seat. After a while, when they've both resumed eating, Elliot's voice pipes up.

"If I did take you up on your offer, what would the sleeping situation be?"

"That's up to you. I do have a spare futon if you'd prefer your own space, but my bed is plenty big enough for two, and I don't mind sharing."

Elliot froze with a bite of food halfway to his mouth, and the fork clattered to the table.

"You damn cheeky dog."

"Is that a no?"

"…bed is fine."

After everything, Elliot refused to back down on the dishes, so he was elbow-deep in soapy water when his phone started ringing. Lida — and presumably also Naveen — was calling. He had gotten countless calls from both of them over the past week, but he had ignored all of them, unable to face the inevitable awkward conversation about running away from his problems.

Unfortunately, Corbeau did catch a glimpse of the name on the phone and saw through any remaining facade. He handed Elliot a towel to dry his hands and began to shuffle him out of the kitchen.

"Answer it, tell them what's going on, that you're ok. It's important to maintain friendships like that."

At first, the video call just showed a ceiling — the caller clearly hadn't expected Elliot to actually answer, which… fair. Then there was a small scream and Lida's face suddenly filled the screen.

"Naveen! Get over here, he picked up!" After a short shuffling sound, a second face joined hers on the phone. Elliot offered a small wave and an even smaller "hey". Laika let herself out of her pokeball, clearly sensing her trainer's anxiety, and they both settled onto a small living room couch. Lida barely waited a moment before unleashing a volley of questions.

"Where have you BEEN?! Are you ok? Where are you now? Are—"

"Lida chill, let him breath," Naveen interrupted. Elliot let out a laugh, and the sense of normalcy washed away a bit of his anxiety.

"I'm fine guys. I'm, uh, really sorry for making y'all worry. After all the… everything, I just kinda freaked out. Especially since… um," he averted his gaze, and unconsciously started petting Laika's tail to self-soothe. "I'm basically in the same boat as y'all."

Lida and Naveen exchanged a confused and concerned look, and Elliot continued, "When I first got here, Taunie just sort of assumed I was here on vacation, and at the time, it didn't feel worth it to explain to a total stranger, but I'm just sort of floating around right now. I could probably find somewhere to live in Paldea if I wanted, but that's just as uncertain as anything else, so… I'm here."

They took it better than Elliot had expected, but then again, they weren't new to "unexpected living situation news" by now.

"So," Naveen started cautiously, "where is 'here'?" "Yeah!" Lida added, "are you still in Lumiose? Can we meet up and talk irl? …please?" Her face maintained a careful "neutral worried" look, but a whole gamut of emotions and tears glimmered just below the surface.

"Yes, yes. I'm still in Lumiose, and I'll probably be here for a while, so we can just hang out whenever y'all want—"

This time the interruption came in duet, "WHERE?!?"

"Oh… I, eheheh… I'm kind of staying at the Rust Syndicate."

A few moments went by in which the silence was absolutely deafening. Then, right as Lida seemed to be prepping to run her mouth, Naveen clapped a hand over it and gave a strained grin. "Well, we're glad you were able to find somewhere. We'll follow up later." Lida raised her brows and nodded enthusiastically, and the call ended.

Elliot sighed and dramatically fell back onto the couch. That went a lot better than he had feared, but the stress was still exhausting. Beside him on the couch, his phone pinged with a message in the MZ groupchat:

{Lida}: so glad we got to talk again, we gotta hang out soonnnnnnn, like lunch or something!!!!!!— love uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu <33333333

{Naveen}: ☝🏿

Elliot just liked both messages and tossed his phone aside — he could decide whether to go through the last week of texts some other time.

A hand dropped down into Elliot's vision, holding a warm ceramic cup. The gentle scent of herbal tea drifted up on the steam, and he accepted it gratefully. After the mess the past week had been, the warm, fragrant tea helped shift "crashing after a long, emotional day" to just "nodding off on the loveseat". This did mean, however, that he was caught off guard when the cushion unexpectedly dipped as Corbeau took a seat next to him, making him slide down until they were sat pressed shoulder to hip.

Elliot let out a drowsy bark of laughter and slung an arm around the other man's shoulders. "Hey, if you wanna snuggle that bad you can just tell me — I've been told I'm [yawn] particularly good at it." Before he could even finish his whole teasing tirade, Elliot was already half asleep, curled into Corbeau's shoulder.

For Corbeau himself, it was more of an exercise in self control. As much as he loathed the idea of disrupting the adorable scene before him, neither of them were spritely teens anymore. If the two men tried to sleep curled up on the loveseat all night, they would be paying back that debt in back pain for at least the next two weeks. And so, after relocating their cups somewhere where they were less likely to get accidentally destroyed, Corbeau nudged Elliot awake and told him to go up to bed — he would shower and be in soon. Elliot fell into a light sleep almost the instant his head hit the pillow, but it didn't last.

Snow swirled around him as he hurtled towards the ground, nearly blocking out the mountainside that rushed past just five feet away. He tumbled midair as he tried to grab ahold, but it was no use — the rocky wall was just out of reach. The fear didn't come until he reached into his bag for the flute to call Lord Braviary. Nothing. The snow thickened the air around him until is vision was nothing but a white-grey void and he couldn't make out the approaching ground. Elliot closed his eyes tight and prayed that the ancient god who brought him to this world would take pity on him.

Elliot jolted awake with a gasp. Sweat ran freezing down the back of his neck, and his racing heartbeat roared in his ears. The room around him was dark — not the white void, not ethereal haze from the place between worlds — just a dark bedroom and a comfortable bed.

And then the mattress shifted beside him. Elliot looked over to see Corbeau sitting propped up on one arm and staring at him with concern, "Are you alright? Did I wake you up?" His voice didn't sound like he'd just woken up, so Elliot assumed he had only just climbed into bed. Sure enough, his phone on the bedside table read a clear 11:46PM. Elliot gave his head a small shake and sighed, "Nightmares."

"I assume you mean normal nightmares, not the mess we just finished cleaning up?"

"Ha! Yeah, but I'd honestly prefer the weird darkrai dreams — they're a lot less…" the humor faded from his voice, "personal."

A few moments passed heavily before Corbeau's voice broke through the silence.

"How can I help?"

Elliot could only stutter as he bit back a series of self-deprecating comments.

"If you want some space, I can—"

"No!" He was up and grabbing the other man's arm before he even realized what he was doing, and Elliot was grateful for the darkness as he felt his face begin to burn in embarrassment. "I… sorry, uh,"

A firm hand on his shoulder interrupted his apologies and pressed him gently back onto the bed.

"Stop apologizing." Corbeau's was so close his breath puffed lightly on Elliot's face, even though his voice was barely above a whisper. "Ok?"

The soft scent of a pomegranate shampoo engulfed Elliot, infinitely more pleasant than it had been in the bottle, and flood of warmth pooled in Elliot's stomach and radiated pleasant tingles along his limbs — it was all he could do to nod in response. This movement caused their foreheads to brush, and sent a small shock through each of them at the point of contact. They stayed frozen like that for what could've been hours, or perhaps just a few heartbeats.

It wasn't clear who leaned in first — maybe it was simultaneous, each drawn in by the other's overwhelming gravity — but the next thing Elliot knew was a warm kiss being pressed to his lips. He brought his free hand up to grab ahold of Corbeau's waist, tugging him ever closer.

They exchanged long, soft kisses until Elliot's head began to spin. That giddy dizziness urged him forward with nowhere to go, so he leaned up onto one arm to try and deepen the kiss. And then suddenly he was flipped onto his back. For a moment, Elliot worried he had crossed a line and been shoved away accordingly. But when he opened his mouth to try and make amends, another kiss cut him off completely. Corbeau's hands cupped Elliot's face, and his weight leaning into his shoulders kept him thoroughly pinned to the bed.

This volley of passion was much more insistent than before, rougher, more… possessive. Elliot tried to keep up, but he eventually gave up and just let himself be kissed while his hands traced lazy swirling patterns up and down Corbeau's back.

After a while, one of the hands on Elliot's face drifted around to brush through his hair. The touch started as a light caress, barely grazing his scalp and leaving trail of tingles in its wake. It didn't stay light though — with every pass, Corbeau's grip tightened on Elliot's hair, until it was a firm, consistent pull. This time, Elliot couldn't contain the pleased noise that shuddered into the other man's mouth.

They broke apart with a gasp, and Corbeau's grip slackened in Elliot's hair, smoothing it out where it had been mussed.

"Damn," he murmured, leaning in close enough for their noses to brush, "I didn't think it would be that easy to get a reaction out of you."

He darted in to steal a kiss before letting himself fall back when Elliot scoffed and shoved him away good-naturedly.

"Go ahead, run your mouth. I'll get your ass when your back is turned."

Corbeau let out a short laugh and pulled Elliot in close. "I look forward to it."

Elliot snuggled in, and within just a few minutes, they were both asleep.

Elliot woke to weak early morning light coming in through the window. He hadn't noticed last night — maybe the blinds had been closed, or maybe he was just too tired to pay any attention — but the view was phenomenal. The window faced the exterior of Lumiose, unobstructed by any taller buildings, so the ridge of mountains that bordered the city was on full display, and the sun was just starting to throw its first rays over the peaks.

As his mind shed the fog of sleep, Elliot slowly became aware of a weight draped across his waist. Initially, he thought Laika was just laying on him, but then he let his eyes roam and quickly remembered where he was.

Corbeau was close, so, so close. And sure, he had been even closer the night before, but that was under the cover of darkness, where reckless decisions didn't matter. In the light day, everything became real again, and so did all the potential consequences and rejection.

And yet the longer he stared, the less any of that seemed to matter. In sleep, all the stress in Corbeau's face had melted away, and just the sight of it sent Elliot's heart racing. His hair had fallen messily across face, and Elliot couldn't resist delicately brushing it back. Whether that touch alone was enough to wake him, or if he had been feigning sleep wasn't clear, but Corbeau's eyes fluttered open all the same. Yellow eyes locked onto brown, and the voice that greeted him was deep with sleep and soft with indescribable fondness.

"Morning, sunshine."